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ONE THOUSAND AND FIFTY COPIES OF 
THIS BOOK HAVE BEEN PRINTED, AND 
THE TYPE DISTRIBUTED. ONE THOU?’ 
SAND COPIES ARE OFFERED FOR SALE 
THIS IS COPY NO... NR 


GUY PATIN 


TY) 
eae PE oa 


LM CE Lee Ci a 


oo EL MS . . ae ‘ : | 
POF . 


4 


(Frontispiece) 
Paris: JEAN Petit. 


39> 


“LETTRES CHOISIES. 





Guy PATIN FROM 


1685. 


mY PATIN 


AND THE MEDICAL PROFESSION 
IN PARIS IN THE XVIZTH CENTURY 


TS 
FRANCIS R. PACKARD, M.D. 


Author of Life and Times of Ambroise Pare 
Editor of Annals of Medical History 


WITH SEVENTEEN ILLUSTRATIONS 
INCLUDING NINE FULL PAGE PLATES 





PAUL B. HOEBER, Inc. 
NEW YORK +» MCMXXV 


CopyYRIGHT, 1924 
By PAUL B. HOEBER, Inc. 


Reprinted, with additions, from 
Annals of Medical History (Volume IV, Nos. 2, 3 and 4) 
Published December, 1924 


Printed in the United States of America 


em qual ¥ a ©. Rourbatum + +2% 


~, 
~ 
J} 
- 


INTRODUCTION 


HE formerly so-celebrated corre- 
spondence of Guy Patin, and even 
his name have fallen recently 
into such undeserved oblivion that 

It seems timely to the writer that an 
attempt should be made to revive interest 
in this famous old French worthy, whose 
letters written during a period of over 
forty years (1630-1672) give us such an 
invaluable picture of the life of the times, 
not only from the medical point of view 
but in all its aspects, military, religious, 
political and courtly. As the great French 
critic, Sainte-Beuve, wrote of Patin’s letters: 


One finds in these letters, bon mots, the news 
of the day, many curious details on the litera- 
ture and learned men of the time, above all a 
lucid and natural manner, with free, bold 
traits, which point to the life, the mind, the 
genius of the author. It is a conversation 
without design, without pretention, often spor- 
tive. They are the confidences of one friend to 
another, full of crudity, of passion, sometimes 
of grossness, often of good sense, humor, and 


salt of every kind. 


{ vu | 


5967938 


4 vil 
Bayle, in his “Dictionnaire biogra- 
phique,”’ warns that “it is necessary to read 
his letters with distrust because most of the 
political and literary anecdotes m them are 
false or ill-founded,” and Voltaire says of 
them: 


His collection of letters has been read with 
avidity because it contained new anecdotes 
which everybody loves, and satires which 
one loves even more. It serves to show how 
much contemporary authors who write pre- 
cipitately the news of the day are unfaithful 
guides for history. Such news ts often false or 
disfigured by malignity and moreover this 
multitude of petty details is scarcely of value 
save to small minds. 


These criticisms may be true as to the 
historic value of Patin’s letters, neverthe- 
less, as pictures of the life of the day they are 
invaluable and it must be remembered 
Guy did not purpose writing history when 
he penned them. 

Reveillé-Parise quotes a statement made 
by Fontenelle, the nephew of Corneille 
and himself a distinguished litterateur, who 
was born in 1647, and thus grew up among 
men who had known Patin personally. In 
his eulogy of Denis Dodart, Fontenelle 
says: “‘AIl the circumstances testified to by 


“ IX F 

M. Patin are worthy of attention. He was 
a physician, very learned and passionate 
for the glory of medicine. He wrote to a 
friend not only with entire but sometimes 
with excessive liberty. Eulogies are not 
very frequent in his Jetters, that which 
dominates them being a very independent 
philosophic bile.” 

Guy did not write his letters for publi- 
cation. The first edition was not published, 
fortunately for him, until he had been in 
his grave eleven years, and was conse- 
quently immune from the vengeance of 
those whom he so bitterly offended by the 
freedom of his language. It is to this that, 
with all due allowance for his individual 
prejudices, which were violent and doubt- 
less unreasonable, the great value of the 
correspondence is due. He wrote of persons 
and events with a liberty, not to say license, 
which he would certainly not have dared use 
had he thought his letters would see the light 
of day, especially as the chief objects of his 
attacks were those high in place, such as 
Richelieu and Mazarin, or powerful organi- 
zations, such as the Jesuits, or the Apothe- 
caries. He is equally caustic and personal 
in his remarks about many of the royal 
family and the nobility, and this at a time 


ix} 
when such writings, if discovered, would 
have brought severe punishment on their 
author. Of his own works which were 
intended for publication Patin says:! 


Posterity will forego my writings, likewise 
I have not much desire to leave any of them. 
There are two sorts of men who write, the wise 
and the fools, and I know myself to be neither 
the one nor the other. Furthermore the life 
that we lead at Paris is too agitated. The 
practice of our profession takes from us that 
tranquillity which it is necessary to have when 
one wishes to write for eternity. 


Elsewhere? he urges Spon to make “un 
beau sacrifice to Vulcan, to burn his Ietters.”’ 

Patin’s correspondents were chiefly phy- 
sicians who were like him imterested in 
literary matters. 

The earliest Ietters we have were ad- 
dressed to the Belins, father and son, each 
named Claude, who practiced medicine 
at Troyes. The two Spons were physicians 
at Lyons. They Itkewise were father and 
son. Charles Spon, the elder, was born at 
Lyons on December 25, 1609, and practiced 
medicine there until his death on February 


1 Letter to Spon, November 8, 1658. 
2 Letter of January 8, 1650. 


“| xi 
21, 1684. In spite of his very large practice 
he was the author of a number of books. 
Reveillé-Parise says his most important 
work was an edition of the ‘Aphorisms 
and Prognostics of Hippocrates” which he 
dedicated to Patin. 

Jacques Spon, the son of Charles, was 
born at Lyons in 1647. Although a physi- 
cian he seems to have been interested 
chiefly m antiquarian research. In company 
with an Englishman named Vehler, he 
traveled extensively through southeastern 
Furope, Greece and Turkey, and pub- 
lished a “Relation” of his travels. As he 
was a Huguenot he retired into Switzerland 
where he died in extreme poverty in 1685, 
the year of the Revocation of the Edict 
of Nantes. 

André Falconet, Patin’s correspondent, 
was of a distinguished Ime of physicians. 
His father, Charles Falconet, was physician 
to Marguerite of Valois, the first wife of 
Henri 1v. André was born at Lyons, Novem- 
ber 12, 1612 and died in 1691. He practiced 
medicine at Lyons with great success. The 
Letters contain many references to his 
son, Noél Falconet,* who was sent to Paris 
to study medicine, and lived there with 

3 November 16, 1644—May 14, 1724. 


xii f 


Patin as his house pupil. Noél had a son, 
Camille Falconet, who after practicing at 
Lyons moved to Paris where he attained 
great distinction, not only as a physician, 
but as a booklover. His history sounds very 
much as if some of the spirit of his father’s 
preceptor had been transmitted to him. 
Camille died at Paris in 1762. 

The formal writings of Guy Patin were 
not numerous and it must be confessed 
that their mterest was mostly ephemeral. 
They will be found listed m an appended 
bibliography, and if one will take the 
trouble to read such of them as are avail- 
able, he will arise from their perusal with 
the conviction that Patin’s fame must rest 
on his correspondence and not on such 
evidences of his erudition or medical skill 
as are contained in_ his professional 
writings. 

This is not the sole mstance in which an 
individual’s posthumous fame has arisen 
from some other attribute than that to which 
he personally would have wished the greater 
importance attached. 

As occurs with all unauthorized or surrep- 
titious publications the correspondence has 
undergone many vicissitudes in the various 
editions in which it has been preserved to 


q xii 
us. Triaire,‘ in the preface to the edition 
which he undertook to publish in 1907 and 
which he intended to be complete and 
definitive, summarily reviews the many 
defects which appertain to each of them. 
He says: 


The editors have not contented themselves 
with throwing aside at their convenience a 
considerable quantity of unpublished docu- 
ments, but they have also not hesitated to 
suppress numerous passages in those which they 
have published. They have gone further yet 
and have not recoiled before alterations of the 
text, before falsification of the ideas of the 
author. They have altered his manuscript, 
replacing a strong and exact expression, such as 
he threw it from his pen, by a dull or insignifi- 
cant word; modifying at their will entire pas- 
sages, giving résumés of these passages instead 
of their complete text: attaching, after cutting 
out without limit, two or three letters together, 
or on the other hand dividing one letter into 
many and forging from the pieces patchworks 
more or less ingenious to supply the solutions 
of continuity which result from such actions. 
All the editions, of which the greater part are 
based on one another, reproduce the errors of 


‘lettres de Gui Patin, 1630-1672. Nouvelle 
édition collectionée sur les manuscrits autographes, 
etc. Paris, 1907. 


‘| xiv 
their predecessors in adding to them faults of 
their own, not excepting the last, the only 


modern one, that of 1846, due to M. Reveillé- 
Parise. 


After this severe arraignment M. Triaire 
relates the several efforts that have been 
made to collate the letters with the object 
of publishing a definitive edition. In 1760 
M. Formy, perpetual secretary of the 
Academy of Berlin, concetved the project 
but for some reason not stated his plan 
aborted. In 1846 Reveillé-Parise published 
an edition at Paris in three volumes for 
which he clarmed completeness and 
accuracy, but which Triaire following 
Sainte-Beuve condemns for inaccuracy and 
incompleteness. 

In 1895 MM. de Montaiglon and Tami- 
sey de la Roque had gathered together all 
the available letters with a mass of correla- 
tive information, notes, etc., when the entire 
collection was destroyed by fire. 

Finally Triaire himself, undaunted by the 
failures of his predecessors, undertook the 
task and gave to the world in 1907 one 
volume of what he promised to make the 
long sought for definitive edition. 

Unfortunately Triaire has only published 
one volume of his edition, and in the corre- 


‘| xv 


spondence therein contained there are only 
the letters written up to March, 1649. He 
has arranged these letters consecutively, 
according to date, whereas Reveillé-Parise 
has collected the letters into groups accord- 
ing to the person to whom they were writ- 
ten. Triaire’s arrangement is preferable. 
In 1911 Pierre Pic published a most 
delightful collection of selections from the 
correspondence® with a learned and inter- 
esting Introduction, in which while admit- 
ting the great value of the “letters” from 
the historic and literary pomt of view he 
deprecates the style m which they are 
written and says that when Sainte-Beuve 
wrote his praise of them he seems not to 
have been struck by the “two principal 
defects of Patin, the eternal idle talk, and 
the ferocious scolding for all that which is 
not his personal opinion.” Pic criticizes 
Patin’s habit of imterlarding his letters 
with Latin, which he says he does not do 
judiciously and correctly after the manner 
of Montaigne, but im a foolishly pedantic 
and often inaccurate way. For those who 
wish to read what is best of Patin and to 
acquire the real flavor of his “letters” 


5Guy Patin avec 74 portraits ou documents. 
Paris, G. Stemheil, 1g1t. 


«| xvi [ 


there is no better edition of them than Pic’s, 
which will certainly stimulate the reader to 
further researches on their author. 

‘Triaire® states: 


The original letters of Patin to the Belins of 
Troyes are contained in the manuscript in- 
scribed at the Bibliothéque Nationale under the 
number 9,438 (Fonds Francais. Suppl. Frangais, 
2,034, bis). This manuscript contains 175 letters 
addressed to Belin pére ei fils—of which one is 
not in the hand of the author but bears his sig- 
nature; twenty-eight letters to Spon, of which 
five have been likewise written by another 
pen but are signed by Patin; a letter without 
any address, but manifestly destined to Spon; 
and one addressed to Charpentier, physician 
of the Faculty of Paris. An inscription indi- 
cates that the manuscript came from the sale 
of M. Gay of Lyons, in 1634. Pic’ states that 
there is in the Library of the Faculté de Méde- 
cine in Paris a collection of 459 letters written 
by Patin to a number of foreign scientists, 
among whom he mentions Thomas Bartholin 
of Copenhagen, Meibomius and Van der 
Linden of Leyden, Scheffer of Frankfort, Gas- 
pard Bauhin of B&le, and Volckamer of 
Nuremberg. The letters are written in Latin 

6 | ettres de Gui Patin, Libraire Honoré Champion. 
Paris, 1907. 

7 Pic, P. Guy Patin, Paris, 1911. 


4] xvu 
and the earliest bears the date March 26, 
1652, and the latest April 4, 1669. The letters in 
this collection are not the originals, but copies, 
some of them by Patin himself, others by his 
eldest son, Robert, who acted as his secretary. 
These letters are unpublished. 


Triaire states that there is a manuscript in 
the Library of Wiesbaden entitled ‘“ Bor- 
bonia ou singularités remarquables prises 
des conversations des Messieurs Nic. Bour- 
bon et Guy Patin.”’ It is accompanied by the 
following recommendations addressed by 
Patin to his son, Charles: 


My son, I talk to you as though this was my 
testament. All these papers which you see here 
are a farrago, a potpourri thrown in a heap 
without order, of a quantity of very various 
things that I have learned or heard spoken 
of by one person or another; but the greater 
part comes from a talk which I have con- 
tinued for many years cum Viro Clarissimo et 
Doctissimo Nicolao Borbonio in the Oratory at 
Paris. There are some points very free and 
delicate as much of religion as of the govern- 
ment of princes. All that which I have said of 
the Jesuits, believe as very true but do not 
repeat unless it be 4 propos. . . . I again 
repeat and recommend to you, read (these 
papers) and burn them sooner than lend them 
to anyone. 


xviii |: 


Nicolas Bourbon, a canon of the Oratory 
in Paris, was a very learned man and a 
great friend of Patin’s. He was the center 
of a learned circle which used to meet at 
the Oratory. Part of the above mentioned 
manuscript was published with the title 
‘‘Borboniana.”’ 

A curious fact is that Pic transcribes a 
similar reeommendation addressed by Patin 
to his son which he says precedes the 
unpublished letters in the Bibliothéque 
de Ja Faculté de Médecine. The latter 
collection was deposited at the Ecole de 
Santé at Paris by Peyrihle in 1794. Triaire 
says that M. Ricci stated that the Wies- 
baden collection was there in 1907. 

Is the Wiesbaden collection the original, 
of which the letters at Paris are the con- 
temporary copies by Patin and his son? 

FRrANcIS R. PACKARD. 

PHILADELPHIA, Pa. 


TABLE OF CONTENTS ths 


PeERODUCTION ne eaiiaiie VII 
I. HisrorrcAL ForEworD.... I 
Il. Patin’s YoutH AND EDUCATION 

AT THE UNIVERSITY OF PaRIS . 25 

Family and Education—Medical 

Education in Paris. 


Il]. La Facutté pE M€épEcINE . . 40 
IV. Home Lire ANpD LITERARY IN- 
BERESTS 2. ew) wa70 


Home Life—Literary Interests— 
Religious Belief —Friendship 
with Naudé. 

V. Patin In RExaTION To His Stvu- 
DENTS AND His Sons... . . 100 
Patin’s Domestic Circle—Robert 
Patin—Charles Patin. 

Niel QPINIONS OF PATIN. . 9 2.5... 136 
The Pharmacopeia of Paris— 
-Patin and the Book Trade— 
Patin’s Health—The Plague and 
Syphilis—Opposition to Cin- 
chona—Orvietan—Patin’s Views 
on Infant Feeding—Venesection 
in Infancy and Old Age—The 


Use of Animal Remedies. 


VII. 


VII. 


IX. 


BIBLIOGRAPHIC NOTEs . 
INDEX OF PERSONAL NAMES. .. . 


[xx] 


SOME OF PaATIN’s CONTRIBUTIONS 
TO LITERATURE. Re 
Honors Conferred on Patin— 
Patin’s Opinion of Physicians— 
Controversy with Renaudot. 
PaTIN EXPERIENCES OPPOSITION 
The Physicians of Paris versus 
Those of Montpellier—Opposi- 
tion to the Use of Antimony— 
Moliére and Patin—Bloodletting. 
Patin’s LATER YEARS. .. . 
Surgeons and Barber-Surgeons— 
The Apothecaries—Side Lights 
on Patin’s Clientele—Richelieu 
and Mazarinm—Social Life in 
France in the Seventeenth Cen- 
tury—Abortion—Louis xiv and 
Medicine—Paris and the Court 
—Public Executions—Demoniac 
Possession—Last Days. 


PAGE 


. 165 


198 


. 239 


- 309 
gag 


LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 


PAGE 
Guy Patin from ‘Lettres Choisie.” 
Paris: Jean Petit, 1685 . . .Frontispiece 


Cardinal de Richelieu (1585-1642) Facing 4 
Cardinal Mazarin (1602-1661). . Facing 9 


mmmaror Guy Patine <4 oe. 39 

emery fatin 6242 fh. AQ 

Jean Riolan, the Younger (1 577-1657) 
Facing 56 


Gabriel Naudé (1600-1653) . . Facing 92 
Title Page of “De Antiquitate” by 
Beepeee NAUGC. 10209 60 6%. ek) 94 
Charles Patin (1633-1693). . . Facing 127 
Title Page of “Lyceum Patavinum” by 
ies F atin, 1652. 6.0. FU 134 
Frontispiece of Philibert Guybert’s “Le 
Médecin Charitable,” Paris: J. Jost, 
COT SE AAS RCN a SE 138 
avy eatin: (1002-1672)... ea 140 
A Physician Making His Professional 
Calls in Paris in the Seventeenth 
BMMEHATEN Sexe rte lek coke py Facing 143 
View of the Interior of the Hopital de Ia 
Charité at Paris during the Reign of 
MES ITT WN Ay aah is OCtne 108 


Xx! 


[xx [> 


PAGE 
Hardouin de Samt-Jacques . .Facing 204 


Francois Guénault (15 -1667) Facing 218 
Invitation to Patin’s Funeral. . . . . 306 


GUY PATIN 


AND THE MEDICAL PROFESSION 
IN PARISIN THE XVIIZH CENTURY 


CHAPTER I 


HIsTORICAL FOREWORD 





yo atin’s life covers a most 
BAT PSs ° ° . ° 
‘fies’ Interesting period in the 
iv ee 

NY history of France. He was 


“<7 born in 1601, and was a 


was assassinated, and he 
2) died in 1672 when Louis 
SY badk/oS4 xiv was atthe height of his 
glory. In order to appreciate his letters and 
their bearing on current events we must com- 
prehend somewhat of the great changes which 
took place in the social and political life of 
France in that period. 

During the latter half of the sixteenth 
century France was torn asunder by the 
religious wars between the Catholics and 
the Huguenots. After Henri 111 was assassi- 
nated at Saint Cloud in 1580, there were five 
years more of bitter warfare before Henri 


[1] 


{2} 
Iv succeeded in winning Paris “by a mass” 
and entered that city as King of France. 
At last civil peace was restored and under 
the wise and conservative government of 
the new king and his great minister, Sully, 
the imternal wounds of France _ healed 
rapidly with the marvelous recuperative 
power which she has shown on so many 
different occasions in her history. A new 
era dawned. Men were at liberty to worship 
according to the dictates of their conscience, 
the Edict of Nantes, promulgated by Henri 
IV in 1598, having granted the Huguenots 
freedom of worship. With peace came pros- 
perity, growth of commerce and agricul- 
ture, with corresponding social and intel- 
lectual development. The murder of Henr1 
Iv, by the dagger of the fanatic, Ravaillac, 
on May 14, 1610, temporarily mterrupted 
this happy state of affairs. 

Henri Iv was succeeded by his son, 
Louis x11, a boy of nine years. Until he 
should reach his majority the affairs of 
the kingdom were placed in the hands 
of the Queen Mother, Marie de’ Medici, 
who was completely controlled by an Ital- 
ian named Concini and his wife, Leonora 
Galigai, who had been Marie de’ Medici’s 
foster-sister. Possessed with rapacity and 
abmition they not only accumulated vast 


| 3 


sums of money from the treasury, but 
Concini had himself made Marquis of 
Ancre, and although he had never been on 
a battlefield, Marshal of France. Sully was 
ignominiously dismissed from the council 
and the regulation of the affairs of the 
kingdom lay entirely in the hands of these 
unscrupulous Italians. Henri 1v had accu- 
mulated in the royal treasury vast sums 
which the Queen Regent squandered in 
gifts on her favorites and m pensions on 
the leaders of the French nobility whom 
she endeavored to reconcile in this manner 
to the domimation of Concini. Although she 
gave with a lavish hand it did not suffice 
to repress their discontent or political am- 
bitions, and revolts broke out on several 
occasions which were with difficulty sup- 
pressed by the Queen Regent’s bestowing 
enormous sums of money on the leaders, 
such as Condé, Mayenne, and de Rohan. 
In 1615, the young King married Anne of 
Austria. Finally in 1617, when Louis was 
sixteen years old, resenting the manner 
in which his mother and Concini excluded 
him from affairs and mspired by deep 
personal hatred of the latter, he entered 
into a conspiracy with his favorite de 
Luynes, a young man of small ability and 
little conscience, and Vitry, the Captain of 


‘| 4 


his Guards. Concini was seized by Vitry 
_as he was entering the Louvre and, as he 
resisted arrest, was instantly killed. His wife 
was arrested and accused of acquiring influ- 
ence over the Queen by practicing sorcery. 
She was found guilty, beheaded and her 
body burned. Louis declared the regency at 
an end and placed de Luynes at the head 
of affairs, but the pride of the old French 
nobility rebelled agamst the overwhelming 
insolence and rapacity of this parvenu as 
much as it did against that of his prede- 
cessor, and they took arms to overthrow 
him. De Luynes died of a fever in 1621. 
After his death the Queen Mother, who had 
been exiled from the court to Blois, became 
reconciled with the King and with her 
return to court, Richelieu, whom she had 
first introduced into public affairs, came 
Into power, and until his death in 1642 
was the predominant influence im the affairs 
of France. To Patin he was the personifi- 
cation of all that was evil, and Patin was 
only one of many who hated the Cardinal 
and sought in many ways to accomplish 
his overthrow. Patin’s hatred was partly 
personal, and as his passions or prejudices 
were violent in all things so his detesta- 
tion of Richelieu’s government may be 





CHELIEU 


BART 


ARDINAL D 
(1585-1642) 


fe 


THE LIBRARY ny 
OF THE - Bei 


Hag NS 


yurvensity OF 


ae 2 0s" 





1940 


largely traced to the fact that at the time 
of the conspiracy of Cing-Mars in 1642, 
Richelieu had executed as one of the 
conspirators, de Thou, the son of the his- 
torian, a great friend of Patin’s. However 
that may be, Patin lets no opportunity slip 
for delivering himself of the bitterest dia- 
tribes against the Cardinal. It is very difh- 
cult to judge Richelieu with impartiality. 
Coming mto power at a time when France 
was fast slipping into the old evil of civil 
war, the great nobles all heading armed fac- 
tions, he managed to weather the storms and 
finally place the real power where it be- 
longed in the hands of the King. The 
Huguenots and Catholics maintained a con- 
dition of armed neutrality, and minor con- 
flicts occurred from time to time which kept 
up the smouldering enmity. The internal 
dissensions of France had weakened her 
standing with other nations, and her mili- 
tary strength was at the lowest ebb. In the 
few years since the death of Henri tv, agri- 
culture and commerce had been again dis- 
turbed by civil commotions and the im- 
provements and reforms: instituted by Sully 
and his great master were neglected. 

One of his first measures was to abase 
the growing power of the Huguenots. 


16iF 
By the Edict of Nantes the Huguenots 
had been granted certain cities, among 
them La Rochelle. The latter they had. 
converted into a powerful fortress, sup- 
ported by a large fleet and army. Richelieu 
determined to suppress this focus of Protes- 
tantism. Taking advantage of an uprising 
of the Huguenots, Richelieu laid siege 
to La Rochelle, and after a siege of fifteen 
months he entered the town in triumph, 
thereby breaking the military power of 
the Huguenots in France forevermore. Their 
military power broken Richelieu treated 
the Protestants with an astonishing I[tb- 
erality, permitiing them to hold their 
religious beliefs and services, to practice 
the liberal professions, and even to hold 
high offices in the army and navy and in 
political and crvil life. Richelieu determined 
from an early day to check the power of 
the nobility. In 1626 the comte de Chalais 
having entered into a conspiracy with a 
number of others to dethrone Louis x11 
and make his brother, Gaston d’Orléans, 
king, Richelieu arrested a number of the 
greatest persons at the Court. The comte 
de Chalais was beheaded, the duchesse 
de Chevreuse, the most intimate friend of 
the Queen, was exiled, some natural sons 


5 beri 


of Henri 1v who had entered into the conspir- 
acy were imprisoned in the Bastille, and 
the duc d’Orléans forced to make the most 
abject professions of loyalty. The most 
stringent edicts had been promulgated 
against duelling. They were set at defiance 
by the nobility until m 1627 when Richelieu 
had two nobles, the comte de Bouteville 
and the comte de Chapelle, executed at 
the Place de Ia Gréve for fighting a duel. 
Even the Queen Mother, to whom Riche- 
lieu owed his start in power, had to succumb 
to the terrible Cardinal. In 1630 she 
persuaded Louis, by working on his fears 
and jealousy, to disgrace the Cardinal. 
The latter left the Court and the courtiers 
all hastened to the apartments of the Queen 
Mother to congratulate her and to ingratiate 
themselves. But the King repented m a 
few hours and Richelieu was recalled. The 
day was known subsequently as the Day 
of Dupes, but those who had deceived 
themselves were bitterly awakened to their 
error. The Queen Mother was sent away 
from the Court to Compiégne, whence 
she fled to Brussels, dying an exile in 1631. 
The garde des sceaux, Marillac, and _ his 
brother, who was a Marshal of France, 
were arrested. The garde des sceaux died 


18} 
in prison and the Marshal was beheaded. 
Bassompierre, the future Marshal of France, 
was put in the Bastille for twelve years. 
Gaston d’Orléans went to Brussels to join 
the Queen Mother. There they concocted 
a new rebellion in conjunction with the duc 
de Montmorency. The royal forces defeated 
the army of the rebels at Castelnaudary in 
1632. Gaston ran away, and the duc de 
Montmorency was executed. 

In 1642 the comte de Cing-Mars at- 
tempted a conspiracy to overthrow Riche- 
lieu. It has been suspected, though never 
proved, that the King was party to the plot. 
It was discovered and Cing Mars, with the 
other Ieaders, was executed. Thus Richelieu 
destroyed the last vestige of feudalism. 
The Fronde was only a phantom of the 
former uprisings of the nobility. 

On December 1, 1642, to the savagely 
expressed joy of Patin, the Cardinal died. 

Richelieu was fond of literature. He 
founded the Académie Frangaise in 1634, 
and rebuilt the Sorbonne. He also estab- 
lished the royal printing press and the ~ 
Jardin des Plantes, the latter being espe- 
cially designed as an aid to medical science. 
Richelieu built and lived in the Palais 
Royal, then known as the Palais Cardinal. 





CARDINAL MAZARIN 
(1602-1661) 


iii ay | 
OF iE er. 
UBIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS ~~ 





‘19 | 


Louis xu only survived his great minis- 
ter about six months, dying on May 14, 
1643. Once more the throne of France was 
left to an infant, Louis xiv, aged less than 
five years, with the regency in the hands 
of a Queen Mother, Anne of Austria, and 
strange to say with another cardinal, Maz- 
arin, an Italian by birth, as chief minister. 
Mazarin had been brought forward by 
Richelieu and proved a worthy pupil 
although undoubtedly not as able or great 
a man as his predecessor. There is much 
ground for the belief that Mazarin was 
secretly married to Anne of Austria or at 
any rate that he was her lover. 

The early years of the new reign were 
marked by the victories of the great 
Condé and Turenne, over the Spaniards 
and Germans in the course of the Thirty 
Years’ War, which dragged on Its weary 
way from 1618 until the Peace of West-. 
phalia m 1648, by which France secured 
possession of Alsace. The finances of the 
country were in a terrible condition at this 
time. The superintendent of finances, Par- 
ticelli d’Esmery, was a corrupt Italian. His 
extravagance and venality necessitated the 
most onerous taxation. Mazarin was much 
more avaricious than Richelieu, amassing 


J 10 I 

enormous wealth for himself and his rela- 
tives. Places at the court and government 
positions, as well as in the army and navy, 
were openly sold, and we can read in Patin’s 
letters the way in which positions in the 
medical service of the court were sold to 
the highest bidder, regardless of merit. 
Mazarin either got all, or a large part of 
most of the bargains thus made. The 
Parlement of Paris had become a center of 
opposition to the corruption and venality 
of the court. Mazarin resolved in August, 
1648, to break the opposition by seizing 
three of the members who had taken the 
most active part. They were named de 
Blancmesnil, Broussel, and Charton. The 
Jast named ran away, de Blancmesnil was 
easily taken prisoner, but when some guards 
had put Broussel in a coach to carry him 
off, a clamor was raised and the popu- 
Jation of Paris rose in revolt. The Parlement 
of Paris marched to the Louvre followed 
by an immense mob. After a brief show of 
resistance the Court yielded and the ar- 
rested magistrates were released. 

This insurrection and that of the Fronde 
which developed immediately afterwards 
were fomented largely by the activity of 
Paul de Gondi, Iater Cardinal de Retz, the 


J uf 
coadjutor to the Archbishop of Paris. He 
was intelligent, wealthy, unscrupulous, and 
above all a demagogue. Mazarin and the 
Queen Mother determined at the first 
auspicious moment to renew the fight, 
when they felt themselves in a stronger 
position. Accordingly, in February, 1649, 
the Queen Mother, with the King and 
Mazarin, left Paris and went to Saint- 
Germain, where the prince de Condé, 
always known as Ie Grand Condé in French 
history because of his illustrious military 
services, took command of the troops which 
remained loyal, and war was declared on 
the Parlement of Paris and the rebellious 
populace. Many of the nobility hastened 
to Paris to take part with the people, 
among them the prince de Conti, younger 
brother of the Great Condé, the duc de 
Longueville, the duc de Bouillon, and the 
duc de Beaufort. The latter, a grandson 
of Henri 1v, had received the nickname 
of the roi des balles, or king of the markets, 
because of his popularity with the market 
women of Paris and the lowest class of the 
people. He was very handsome, with affable 
manners but absolutely devoid of capacity. 
The prince de Conti was chosen commander 
of the peoples’ army. The coadjutor de 


“| 12 

Retz displayed the most feverish activity 
in stirring up the rebellion and maintaining 
the spirits of the party. He raised a regi- 
ment of cavalry which was dubbed in 
ridicule the regiment of Corinth because 
de Retz was titular bishop of Corinth. 
This civil war on a small scale received 
the name of the Fronde because of a 
game which was very popular with the 
children of that epoch in France. It con- 
sisted of throwing stones at one another by 
means of an instrument like a slingshot, 
made of a piece of leather between two 
strings. The police having forbidden this 
amusement the boys were in the habit of 
using their weapons on the officers who chased 
them. Hence those who were opposed to the 
authorities recerved the name of Frondeurs. 

The so-called war, as Voltaire says, 
would have been entirely ridiculous had 
it not been participated in by a king of 
France, and the Great Condé, and involved 
the capital of the kmgdom. The peoples’ 
troops made many sorties from Paris, | 
which were uniformly repulsed. On their 
return they would be hooted and jeered at 
by their fellow-citizens for whose cause they 
had gone forth to fight. The Parlement 
having ordered that each house having a 


asets 
porte-cochére should furnish a man and a 
horse for the service, the cavalry raised by 
the city in this way was known as the 
cavalry of the porte-cochéres. The popular 
cause suffered because the nobility who had 
attached themselves to it were not animated 
by any real desire to further it. but only 
by selfish ambition and vanity coupled 
with personal hatred of the Cardinal and 
Queen Mother. The contemporary revolu- 
tion in England succeeded because the men 
who participated In it were united in an 
earnest resolve to correct abuses. In France 
though the abuses existed there was a lack 
of unity among the groups of the peoples’ 
party which, coupled with the unscrupulous 
ambition and levity of those who were 
chosen as its leaders, soon [ed to its disin- 
tegration. Some of the nobility actually 
attempted to negotiate with Spain, then 
at war with France, for aid against the 
Mazarinists, as they preferred to designate 
their antagonists. It must be remembered 
that the Parlement of Paris was not at all 
similar to the institution bearing the name 
parliament in England. In France the term 
“‘parlement” was applied to bodies which 
existed at Paris, Bordeaux and elsewhere 
in France, composed of lawyers and promi- 


| 14 } 
nent bourgeois of the several districts in 
which they were constituted. They were 
not only legislative but also judicial bodies. 
The Parlement of Paris awoke to a realiza- 
tion that their cause was being betrayed 
by the nobility. Condé had wisely refrained 
from any serious attack on the city of 
Paris, contenting himself with merely re- 
pulsing the irregular militia which sallied 
from time to time from Its walls. The Parle- 
ment entered mto negotiations with the 
King’s party and an agreement was soon 
signed by which the King granted certain 
concessions, and Paris opened its gates in 
April, 1649, for the return of the court. As 
usual the great nobles who had participated 
on the popular side were easily brought over 
to the King by the bestowal of money and 
places. The reconciliation was of short 
duration. The Great Condé offended Maza- 
rin and the Queen Mother by constantly 
reminding them that they owed their return 
to power to him, and he alienated the 
Parlement and bourgeois by the contempt 
with which he uniformly treated them. In 
January, 1650, Mazarin arrested Condé, 
his brother, the prince de Conti and the duc 
de Longueville and put them im prison at 
Vincennes. At first this arrest of the leaders 


1:15 5 
of both factions seemed to please the fickle 
populace, but the arrogance of Mazarin 
soon reunited the two factions against 
him, and instigated by Gondi, to whom 
Mazarin had promised a cardinal’s hat 
but had not fulfilled his promise, the Fronde 
rushed into a new revolt. This time they 
achieved a temporary success, forcing the 
Queen Mother in February, 16451, to liber- 
ate Condé, Conti and de Longueville, and to 
exile Mazarin from France. Mazarin went 
to Cologne but from that city continued to 
influence the Queen Regent. Gondi at last 
secured the long desired cardinal’s hat, 
but the Great Condé was dissatisfied with 
the result of the revolt. He was liberated 
from prison but instead of finding himself 
at the head of affairs he soon realized that 
Mazarin yet controlled them from his 
place of exile, by his power over the Queen 
Mother. This great soldier then became 
a traitor. He entered into a treaty with the 
Spaniards and raised an armed force against 
the King. Mazarin was hastily summoned 
back to Paris by Anne of Austria and the 
famous General Turenne was given command 
of the royal troops. At first Condé was suc- 
cessful. The Court fled from Parts. Finally 
both the royal army under Turenne, and the 


‘| 16 | 

rebel army under Condé approached Paris, 
each demanding that the city open its gates 
to them. The Parisians refused entrée to 
both. Gaston, duc d’Orléans, with his 
daughter the famous Mademoiselle, and the 
Cardinal de Retz were in the city. The royal 
troops and the rebels fought a battle m the 
Faubourg Saint-Antoine, and Mademoiselle 
ordered the cannon of the Bastille to fire 
on the royal troops, and the gates of the 
city to be opened to Condé’s army. The 
latter entered the city, but finding he could 
not hold it retired and led his army to join 
the Spanish troops in Flanders. The party 
of the King and Mazarin triumphed. The 
Cardinal was more powerful and arrogant 
than ever. The duc d’Orléans was exiled 
to Blois, de Retz was imprisoned, Condé 
sentenced to death in contumacy, and a 
royal edict forbade the Parlement hence- 
forth to attempt any interference in affairs 
of state or finance. The war with Spain 
was carried on. Mazarin entered into an 
alliance with Oliver Cromwell, the Protes- 
tant ruler who had beheaded the king whose 
wife was the daughter of Henri tv. Peace 
was finally made in 1659. As part of its 
terms Condé was pardoned and Louis xiv. 
married the Infanta Marie Thérése. 


bee 

Mazarin was as bitterly hated by Patin 
as Richelieu had been. He inveighs against 
his arrogance, his avarice and the way in 
which he provided for the welfare of his 
family at the expense of France. Even 
the splendid library founded by Mazarin for 
the use of men of letters, of which Patin’s 
friend Gabriel Naudé was librarian, and the 
establishment of the College of the Four 
Nations at the University of Paris designed 
to provide for scholars from Spam, Italy, 
Germany and the Low Countries, could not 
make Patin see any good in this chaperon 
rouge. The letters express nothing but 
hatred and contempt towards him. Mazarin 
died on March 9, 1661. 

The last decade of Patin’s life corresponds 
with the first. ten years of the personal 
reign of Louis xiv. While Mazarin lived 
he was the dominant power im the kingdom, 
but after his death Louis could truthfully 
state: “L’ état, c’est moi.’ One of the earliest 
manifestations of his desire for absolute 
control was the disgrace of Fouquet.' 


1 Those who are readers of Dumas will recall the 
Vicomte de Bragelonne, in which romance the dis- 
grace of Fouquet forms the principal theme. The 
Letters of Madame de Sévigné contain much infor- 
mation about his trial. 


J 18 
Fouquet as minister of finance, though a 
man of superior ability, had thrown the 
finances into extreme disorder, by reckless 
extravagance. He had accumulated an im- 
mense personal fortune. In 1661 he gave a 
magnificent féte to the King at his superb 
chateau de Vaux, the glories of which out- 
shone those of the royal palaces. The King 
was angered. at the display, but rt was prob- 
ably only the culmination of his discontent 
at the minister against whom Colbert had 
for some time been arousing the King’s 
suspicions. A few weeks later m Septem- 
ber, 1661, Fouquet was arrested. His trial 
continued for three years. At the end he 
was found guilty. Nine judges wished him 
executed, thirteen were for imprisonment 
for life. Fouquet had been a great pa- 
tron of letters. La Fontaine, Pellisson, 
Mademoiselle de Scudéry and Madame 
de Sévigné all owed much to his patronage 
and have defended his memory. His place 
was given to Colbert, under whose able 
administration was finally grouped not 
only the finances, but also the direction of 
the beaux-arts, agriculture, commerce, pub- 
lic works and the navy. Patin naturally 
sympathized with Fouquet. He termed 
Colbert a “man of marble” and could see 


‘| 19 | 
no good in one of the greatest of the great 
ministers of Louis xiv. 

Another man who contributed much to 
the glory of the reign of the roi soleil was 
Louvois, his minister of war. He was the 
first to ordain a distinctive military uniform 
for the different units of the army; to mntro- 
duce the use of the bayonet attached to 
the musket; to organize magazines for the 
storage of powder, arms and munitions in 
different places whence they could be readily 
distributed in case of need, and he organized 
the army into special divisions: cavalry, 
artillery, infantry, and subdivided these 
again into special bodies trained for their 
various duties: dragoons, hussards, grena- 
diers, fusileers, etc. He also established a 
special corps of engineers and first brought 
into use portable pontoon bridges, and he 
was the first to arrange for camps of 
maneuvre in times of peace. Under Louvois 
the great military engineer, Vauban, con- 
structed the fortifications along the frontier 
which for so many generations held the 
external enemies of France in check. Vauban 
was the greatest master of fortification and 
of the construction of siege works and his 
ideas and inventions completely changed 
the methods of making war. 


‘| 20 F 

To the military successes of Louis xiv, 
Colbert contributed greatly by his able 
administration of the navy. Mazarin had 
left this: important arm in a deplorable 
condition. Colbert built up a wonderful 
merchant marine and used it as a feeder 
for the establishment of a navy which soon 
rendered France a formidable power at sea. 
He brought foreign shipbuilders to work on 
the construction of new warships, and built 
huge yards at various ports. Schools of 
navigation, of hydrography, and of naval 
warfare were established. Rank in the navy 
was established in order to attract men of 
birth and intelligence, and an inscription 
maritime or naval reserve was organized 
among the maritime population. In external 
affairs the glory of France was equally well 
maintained by an able minister, de Pionne, 
who died in 1671, the year before Patin’s 
death. Spain was in a decadence which the 
ambition of Philip 11 had begun. Italy 
was constantly at war. Germany was in the 
same chaotic condition and Austria so 
weak that she was obliged to appeal for aid 
to repel the menaces of the Turks. England 
had just restored the Stuarts. Holland was 
the richest and actually the most menacing 
of the rival countries, chiefly because of its 


‘| 21 | 

naval power. Louis xiv availed himself 
skilfully of the weaknesses of her neighbors 
to agerandize France. Though Patin speaks 
contemptuously of many of the acts by 
which Louis supported his policy and 
achieved his objects. their success was 
obvious, and until 1685, the year of the 
Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, the 
prosperity of France and the glory of Its 
King steadily mcreased. 

In 1665 Philip 1v of Spain died, leaving 
a son, Charles 1, the issue of a second 
marriage. When Louis xiv was married 
to Marie Thérése, Philip’s daughter by 
his first wife, in 1659, 1t had been stipulated 
that she should renounce her rights of 
succession to the Spanish crown and in 
lieu thereof the Spanish government was 
to give her a dot of 4,000,000 gold écus. 
Mazarin calculated that Spain would be 
unable or unwilling to pay this immense 
sum and that the way would thus be paved 
‘for the French to claim the succession. 
When Philip died in 1665, the dot not 
having been paid, Louis xiv at once claimed 
for his wife her rights of succession in 
the Low Countries, also asserting that as 
his wife was a minor at the time of her 
marriage her father had no right to renounce 


‘| 22 |e 
her succession in her name. Upon the refusal 
of the Spanish government to comply with 
his demand Louis invaded Flanders in 
1667. Its conquest was easy. Town after 
town yielded. Holland alarmed at this 
success formed an alliance with England 
and Sweden, and Louis decided not to 
proceed further in his triumphal career. 
The treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle was concluded 
with Spain in 1668. Louis was bitterly 
offended by the action of Holland and deter- 
mined to be avenged on the bourgeois 
commonwealth. By a large bribe he seduced 
the Swedes from the alliance. His brother, 
Philippe d’Orléans, a very worthless indi- 
vidual, had married Henrietta, the sister 
of Charles 11, who was known by the official 
title of Madame. She was chosen to negoti- 
ate with Charles 11 in 1670 and soon 
succeeded in persuading and bribing her 
brother to abandon the Hollanders and 
enter into an alliance with the French King. 
On her return to the French court Madame 
died suddenly. Suspicions of poisoning were 
at once aroused but they were certainly 
groundless. Bossuet preached a famous 
sermon in her honor. The neutrality or aid 
of the Emperor and the various petty 
potentates of Germany was secured, and the 


‘| 23 | 
way being thus prepared, in the spring of 
1672 France declared war on Holland. 
Although the French won great military 
successes at its outset, this war was the 
beginning of the misfortunes which dark- 
ened the last years of the reign of Louis 
xiv. Within a few years England and most 
of his other allies had abandoned him. 
New alliances were formed to combat his 
overweening ambition. Against Prince Eu- 
géne and Marlborough the French armies 
sustained a series of terrible defeats. The 
Prince of Orange, his most determined foe, 
became King of England and the old 
French King saw the splendor of his reign 
sink in an obscuring twilight. By the 
Revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685 
France lost 500,000 of her best citizens, 
and much of her commercial prosperity. 
Patin died in the spring of 1672 just at the 
dawning of evil times. During his life he 
had witnessed the gradual emergence of 
France from the chaos of the Fronde to 
the firm although despotic government of 
an absolute monarch. His letters give many 
illuminating reflections of the stirring events 
of which he lived in the very center and 
many of the chief actors whom he knew. 
It would have been hard for him to write 


| 24 | 

without bias, and though the pictures he 
paints are somewhat lurid, they are cer- 
tainly honest representations of events as he 
saw them from day to day. Patin was an 
ardent student of philosophy and theology 
and his letters are full of information about 
the Jansenist controversy and the many 
other disputes with which the learned of the 
seventeenth century filled so many volumes 
now condemned to oblivion. It would seem 
that in his later days the bitterness of 
political squabbles had been replaced by the 
odium theologicum. Although he was a 
vigorous opponent of the dominant party, 
hating the Jesuits and denouncing monks 
on every possible occasion, he nevertheless 
managed not to make himself conspicuous 
enough to undergo any persecution for his 
opinions, and he apparently died in the 
Roman Catholic faith and was certainly 
buried according to Its rites. 


CHAPTER II 


PaTIN’s YOUTH AND EDUCATION AT THE 
UNIVERSITY OF PARIS 


FAMILY AND EDUCATION 


As he signed himself frequently “ Bello- 
vacensis”’ (of Beauvais) many writers assert 
that Patin was a native of that city. 
Reveillé-Parise says he was born at La 
Place, a small hamlet in the commune of 
Hodenc-en-Bray in which the Patin family 
held a fief from time immemorial, and in 
1898 the municipality of La Place erected 
a monument to his memory. In a letter to 
Spon (June 14, 1644) Patin himself says 
that his natal place was a village three 
leagues from Beauvais in Picardy, named 
‘““Houdan” which was the name borne by 
Hodenc-en-Bray until 1770, and according 
to Triaire, Guy Patin was born there at 
the Ferme des Préaux on Friday, August 
BILe1OOT. 

His family was typical of the best class 
of bourgeois. Patin states that he had 
traced it back for 300 years, during which 
period some had been notaries at Beauvais, 

[ 25] 


‘| 26 [> 


some linen merchants at Paris, some soldiers 
and others farmers. Patin’s grandfather 
was a soldier “comme tout ce temps-la 
fut de guerre.” His father Francois had 
studied Iaw at Orléans and Bourges and 
would have practiced his profession at Paris 
had it not been for the death of Henri 111, 
and the siege of Paris which followed 
thereon. He must have been a Huguenot 
sympathizer because he had been made a 
prisoner by the Leaguers and had had to pay 
a large ransom to secure his release. Guy 
says that his grandmother had to pledge her 
wedding jewelry and a belt of silver with a 
goldsmith at Beauvais to raise the money 
and that many times he had heard her tell 
about it, “weeping and detesting the mis- 
fortunes of those times.” 

Patin inherited his parent’s hatred for 
the Guises. The League had been formed by 
their adherents and they aimed at procuring 
for their family the succession to the throne, 
either by the deposition of Henri 111 or, 
if not, by successful rebellion in the event 
of his death, as he had no direct heirs and 
Henri de Navarre, the nearest in the succes- 
sion was a Huguenot. Henri 111 forestalled 
the plans of the Guises and their League 
by the murder of the duc Henri de Guise 


‘| 27 | 
and his brother, the Cardinal. The duc de 
Guise was known by the nickname Balafré, 
the scarred, because of a huge cicatrix 
which disfigured his face. Patin writes Spon 
(December 24, 1658): 


M. de Guise-le-Balafré said formerly: 


By war we gain 
Credit and money 
He was the duc de Guise, who was chief of 

the League and whom Henri 111, by a wise and 
generous council, caused to be killed at Blois, 
in the year 1588 on Christmas Eve. My late 
father, who hated the League and the Leaguers, 
said when I was yet young, that this massacre 
was the best coup that this king made in his 
life. 


Gaspard D’Auxy, Seigneur de Monceaux 
and Baron de Houdan, recognizing the 
honesty and ability of Francois Patin 
persuaded him to give up his career at the 
Paris bar and come back to Picardy to 
manage the business affairs of his family 
and estate. He made Patin many generous 
promises which Guy says he did not fulfill. 
The great man did procure for his man of 
affairs a virtuous and well-to-do wife of 
good family, Claude Manessier, having in 
mind thereby to fix him in the neighborhood 


‘| 28 | 


and keep him away from Paris; otherwise 
Guy says that he was ungrateful and 
avaricious and ruined what would otherwise 
have been the very successful career of the 
elder Patin at Paris. 

Patin in a letter to Falconet (July 15, 
1661) gives another version of the reason 
his father left Paris. He writes: “My father 
and mother were good people, who retired 
to the country to get away from the evil 
(malice) of Paris, where they lived ex avito 
fundulo until they died.”’ 

The Patins had seven children, five 
daughters and two sons. Guy’s brother 
settled himself in Holland, and the five 
daughters all married and established them- 
selves with the inheritance of their mother’s 
money. The regret of the father at his own 
mistaken step, led him to the determination 
that Guy should fare better. 

For this reason he began his son’s educa- 
tion at a very early age, one of the steps 
he took being to cause his son to read 
Plutarch’s “‘Lives” aloud while he would 
correct his pronunciation. At the age of 
nine years he placed him in the Collége at 
Beauvais, and afterwards sent him to the 
Collége de Boncourt in Paris, where the 
boy was for two years a pensionnaire, taking 


“| 29 f 

the course in philosophy. An offer of a 
benefice was made to Patin by some of 
the nobility. To accept this it was necessary 
for him to become a priest which he refused 
to do, thereby greatly angering his mother 
who did not overcome her resentment for 
ftve years, although his father approved 
his course. A friend of his advised him 
to study medicine and he did so at Paris 
from 1622 to 1627 when he received his 
degree, at which, as he tells us, his mother, 
as well as his father, was well pleased and 
helped in the purchase of books and other 
necessary expenses. Bayle states on the 
authority of Drélincourt that Patin eked 
out a living in Paris while pursuing his 
studies by proof-reading. There is a tradi- 
tion that the anonymous friend who, Patin 
says, urged him to study medicine was 
Riolan, the anatomist of Paris. Ruiolan 
is chiefly remembered for the bitterness with 
which he fought Harvey’s demonstration 
of the circulation. Patin does not refer to 
him in any way in his autobiographical 
letter to Spon, in which, from its character, 
one would think he would have mentioned 
so great an influence in his life. 

_ This statement is also made in “Nau- 
deana et Patiniana”’: 


130% 

By a fatality too common to men of letters 
he was compelled to become a proof-reader after 
having received his degree. On seeing some of 
his corrections, M. Riolan, the celebrated phy- 
sician, who was regarded among his confréres as 
the arbiter of reputations, bestowed on him his 
esteem and friendship, and introduced him to 
the world. 


MEDICAL EDUCATION IN PARIS 


The “Letters,” as would be expected, 
are full of references to medical education 
as It prevailed in the University of Paris. 
As Muinivielle' emphasizes, the teaching 
consisted entirely in the exposition of the 
works of Hippocrates, Galen and the lesser 
ancients. There was no attempt at clinrcal 
instruction; and medical learning, as mani- 
fested by the professors, consisted solely 
in a display of great erudition in the texts 
of Greek and Latin authors. In order to 
enter on the study of medicine in the 
Faculté de Médecine at the Université de 
Paris, tt was necessary first to possess the 
degree of Master of Arts or else to have 
studied philosophy for at least two years, 
and then there were three steps to the 
degree, that of bachelor, licentiate and 


11a médecine au temps d’Henri tv. 


{31 | 
finally doctor. After two years study in 
medicine, if the scholar was twenty-two 
years old, he could take his examination 
for his bachelorship. He had to produce first 
a certificate of good conduct from three 
physicians, to declare that he belonged to 
the Catholic Church, and to swear on the 
Bible that he would be present at the masses 
said before the Faculté de Médecine. After 
these formalities were complied with he 
was questioned during three days on the 
studies he had pursued and then had to 
comment on an aphorism of Hippocrates. 
If he succeeded in passing this ordeal he 
took an oath that he would defend the 
decrees, practices, customs and statutes of 
the Faculty; that he would show respect 
and honor to the Dean and all the Masters 
of the Faculty; that he would defend the 
Faculty against whosoever would undertake 
anything against its statutes or honor, 
and above all against those who practiced 
medicine illegally; and that he would be 
present in his robes at all the masses ordered 
by the Faculty, arriving before the end of 
the Epistle and remaining until the end of 
the service, and that he would attend the 
masses for the dead, and the funerals of 
the Masters (professors) under penalty of 


tSeuk 

a gold crown for failure to do so. Minivielle, 
whose delightful little book contains the 
most explicit account of the life of the 
medical student at Paris in the sixteenth 
century, states that after having thus been 
admitted a bachelor in medicine, the stu- 
dent passed the next two years In sustaining 
theses, studying, sometimes visiting sick 
persons with the masters, with an occasional 
opportunity to witness an anatomical dem- 
onstration on the human body. 

Such opportunities to witness, not ac- 
tually perform, dissections on the human 
body must have been very rare, for Patin 
writes to Charles Spon (May 7, 1657) about 
a young man who had proposed to visit 
Paris to study medicine: “If he had come 
last winter he would have been able to see 
dissections very easily, because we have 
never had so many. Four public dissections 
were held in our schools, of which two were 
held on women, and more than six by the 
surgeons, which he could have witnessed.” 

Saumaise gave an introductory letter to 
Patin to a young man who wished to study 
medicine at Paris and Patin writes Spon 
(December 8, 1649) with what pleasure 
he would do all he could for the young man 
because of his admiration for Saumaise: 


‘| 33 + 

This is why I have offered him what a certain 
man promised and offered in Terence, rem, 
opem, operam et consilium, and also money 
when he wished it. He asks to see anatomical 
dissections, surgical operations, the debates in 
our hospitals. He will have all this and more. 
I have promised to boot to take him to see some 
patients with me, and that he may attend some 
of our consultations where among others he 
will encounter Messieurs Riolan and Moreau. 


The bachelors in medicine had to sustain 
certain theses in public, or as we would now 
term it, undergo public examinations on 
medical subjects. These were of two kinds, 
first the thése quodlibétaire, which might be 
chosen from any subject in medicine or 
physiology, on which the candidate was 
questioned from six in the morning until 
noon, by nine doctors. The examination 
was conducted entirely mn Latin. Second the 
thése cardinale, so called after the Cardinal 
d’Estouteville, who instituted It In 1442, 
at the time when he was engaged in reform- 
ing the teaching at the University of Paris. 
The thése cardinale was sustained by the 
candidate for license in much the same 
manner as the other, but its subject had 
to appertain to hygiene. Minrivielle quotes 
some of the bizarre and absurd topics uti- 


| 34 


lized as subjects for the theses, such as: 
““Was the cure of Tobias by the gall of the 
fish natural?” “Is it salutary to inebriate 
oneself once a month?” “Are beautiful 
women more apt to bear children?” 
“What think you of the saying in vino 
veritas ?”’ 

The young man who presented a thesis 
had not only to sustain his argument but 
the ideas which he expressed had to be in 
strict conformity with the opinions of the 
majority of the physicians of the Faculté de 
Médecine, otherwise the thesis was sure to 
be rejected, as illustrated by the following 
episode related by Patin in a letter to 
Charles Spon (December 24, 1655): 


A young doctor of the antimonial cabal 
presented a thesis to the Faculté with this 
conclusion, Ergo plueritidis initio purgatio, 
which was signed and approved by the Dean 
et ipso stibiale. The Censor of the Faculty 
opposed the thesis. The Dean, on the con- 
trary judged it would injure his dignity to 
yield (to the opposition) and ordered the 
Beadle to distribute (the thesis). The Censor 
went to see M. Riolan, as the ancient of the 
College, in order that by his authority he 
would assemble the company (Faculty), and 
this he ordered. The Dean named de Bourges, 


| 35 | 

learned the design of M. Riolan, of the Censor, 
M. le Compte, and of most of the elders, to 
hold this assembly, where we had about sixty 
doctors. Guénault even came in order to sustain 
the thesis. He and his antimonial cabal were 
shorn. Forty-five of us voted that the thesis 
should be condemned and revoked, and we 
ordered the doctor to write another, which 
shall be approved by the Dean, distributed to 
the doctors, disputed in due time and place 
in the College. Meanwhile there is to be a sus- 
pension of all acts mn the College. The thesis was 
condemned not as problematic, but as false and 
criminal, pernicious to the lives of men and 
to the public welfare, 


An unconscious testimony of the im- 
portance attached to learning from books 
instead of reading in the book of nature is 
given in the following extract from a 
letter of Patin?: “The fourth of May the 
examination in botany was held in our 
colleges. Bon Dieu, but they put good 
questions! One could make a good book of 
them. There was a doctor who proposed 
beautiful things, et plus quam miribilia, de 
fungis. It is necessary to have read many 
books to get from them such a great quan- 
tity of good things.” 

? Letter to Charles Spon, June 18, 1658. 


| 36 | 

Guy Patin’s first thése quodlibétaire sus- 
tained December 19, 1624, had for its 
title ‘“Estne feminae In virum mutatio a 
adbvros?”” which he wisely decided in the 
negative. On November 27, 1625, he took 
the negative side in a thesis having for its 
proposition ‘“‘An_ praegnanti periculosé 
laboranti abortus?” 

On March 26, 1626, for his cardinal 
thesis he chose for his subject “‘Daturne 
certum graviditatis indicum ex urina?” 
again taking the negative side. Pierre 
Pic? remarks that contrary to the usual 
practice Guy concludes for the negative 
in each of his three theses and speculates 
whether this was not an indication of his 
character, which was already contradictory. 

The first thesis at which Patin presided 
was that of G. Joudounyn, December 16, 
1627, entitled ‘“‘Utrum bnvopavia bal- 
neum?” (Are baths useful in uteromania?). 
Patin is said to have suggested the subject 
to Joudouyn because of the case of a young 
girl whom he had attended and whom it is 
said her mother wished him to marry.‘ 

At first the theses were written and pre- 
sented in manuscript to the Dean of the 

3 Guy Patin, Paris, 1911. 

‘Letter to Falconet, September 19, 1659. 


| 37'F 
Faculté de Médecine, but toward the end 
of the sixteenth century the students began 
to have them printed and as we all know 
the custom of printing the theses for the 
doctorate has continued to the present 
time in France. 

After two years passed in this manner, 
the bachelors presented themselves for 
examination for the licentiate. Each candi- 
date had to present himself before the 
docteurs-régents of the Faculté, at the 
doctor’s home, where he was privately 
examined by that worthy. Then the Faculté 
would hold a meeting at which a secret 
ballot was cast by its members, as to 
whether the candidate should be licensed. 
If successful he did not at once receive the 
full license but was first admitted to the 
ranks of the licentiandes. These happy 
ones formed a procession and preceded by 
the beadles of the Faculté, rendered a 
ceremonial visit to the official bodies in 
Paris, that is to the members of the Parle- 
ment of Paris, the ministers of state, the 
provost of the merchants and the aldermen, 
requesting their presence at the solemn 
ceremony which marked the actual be- 
stowal of the license on those who had 
passed their examinations. This ceremony 


1 38 | 

of the “Paranymph” derived its name from 
the ancient Greek marriage custom in 
which a young man, the best man of the 
bridegroom, always conducted the latter 
to the residence of the newly-wedded pair. 
In this ceremony of the Faculté, the bride- 
groom was the licentiate, the bride, the 
Faculté de Médecine and the paranymph 
was the Dean who united the licentiate 
in solemn wedlock to the Faculté de 
Médecine. Some days later there was 
another grand ceremony in the hall of the 
Archbishop’s palace in Paris, at which 
the Chancellor of the Faculté de Médecine, 
who was a canon of the Archdiocese of 
Paris, gave them the benediction of the 
church, and afterwards all those present 
assisted at a grand mass of Notre Dame. 

After having become a licentiate, the 
young man was authorized to practice 
and teach medicine, but in order to obtain 
a vote in the deliberations of the Faculté 
it was necessary for him to go yet further 
and secure the degree of Doctor of Medicine. 
This required a further investigation into 
the learning and morals of the candidate 
and he had to sustain another thesis, the 
vesperte. I'wo doctors of the Faculté pro- 
pounded a question to be discussed by 


‘| 39 | | 
the candidate with them. If he passed this 
ordeal successfully, the Iast act of his 
career as a medical student took place in 
the grand hall of the Ecole de Médecine, 
when he received the square bonnet worn 
by the doctors of the Faculté. 





MES ARMES DE GUY PATIN | 


BSA NR PN ER a Raber nea ed Ration ree | 


CHAPTER III 


La FAcuLTE DE MEDECINE 


To be a member of the Faculté de Méde- 
cine de Paris was to Guy the ne plus 
ultra in human affairs. The jealousy with 
which he guarded the prerogatives of Its 
members was manifested from the time 
when he first was admitted to its ranks. 
In Patin’s time the question of precedence 
_ loomed large in daily life and gave rise to 
innumerable squabbles. He tells Falconet 
(November 5, 1649) of one in which he was 
engaged early in his professional career: 


I remember twenty-three years ago, being a 
young doctor and not yet married, I was asked 
to carry the canopy (le ciel) in a procession of the 
Holy Sacrement, the day of the grand-féte, 
which they celebrate here with all sorts of 
solemnities. I knew about how much I should be 
esteemed and also how my colleagues had acted 
in a like case. Being by them incited to do this I 
promised them I would on condition that 
because of my rank of docteur-régent of the 
Faculté, I should have the first place, not ceding 
it to any but counsellors of the sovereign court. 
This was promised me, but when I came to take 

[ 40 ] 


41 i 

it, with my scarlet cape, as we are clad when we 
become doctors (receive the degree), dispute, or 
preside (at meetings) or when we attend the 
funeral of one of our colleagues, two men wished 
to have the first place before me, of which one 
was conseiller aux monnaies, the other secré- 
taire du row. I alleged that it was due me. 
All the notables of the parish who were gathered 
for the procession, assembled at once, among 
them old M. Seguin, premier médecin de la 
reine, who died Dean of our company, January 
27, 1648, and said in my favor that I was as 
great a doctor as he im our Faculté and in 
Paris. There was also a counsellor of the court, 
some masters of accounts, and an old advocate, 
who awarded me the precedence. Those who 
lost against me gave way at once, out of respect, 
they said, for the procession, but they grumbled 
that I should precede them.} 

1 Voltaire in “Le siécle de Louis xtv,’’ speaking 
of the spirit of discord which prevailed in France at 
the end of the reign of Louis x11, says that it 
prevailed throughout the kingdom, extending from 
the court and Paris to the smallest communes and 
parishes, in which processions fought one another 
for the honor of their banners. Often the canons of 
Notre Dame came to actual fisticuffs with those of 
Sainte-Chapelle. The Parlement of Paris and the 
Chambre des Comptes fought one another for pre- 
cedence actually inside the church of Notre Dame 
the day that Louis x11 placed his kingdom under 
the protection of the Virgin Mary, August 5, 1638. 


| 42 I 

In order to form a just conception of 
Guy Patin’s life and letters some knowledge 
of the institution about which his whole 
bemg centered and which absorbed the 
greatest part of his energies is absolutely 
essential. The life interest of Patin was 
centered in the Faculté de Médecine de 
Paris. Many men devote their lives to 
a cause, some to a person and not a few to 
an institution. The latter was avowedly 
and definitely the case with Patin. From 
first to Iast in almost all of the numerous 
letters which have been preserved to us, 
he refers to it or to matters connected 
with it. The preservation of its rights and 
privileges, the admission of only those whom 
he considered worthy to its ranks, the expul- 
sion of those who had proved themselves 
unworthy of its fellowship, the election of 
suitable officers to guide its policies, the 
increase of its authority and wealth and 
the extension of its usefulness, occupied 
his mind almost as an obsession. No praise 
was too fulsome for those who furthered 
Its cause and no abuse too savage for those 
who dared to attack it. As many of its 
peculiar attributes brought the Faculté 
into relation with public men and matters, 
a very general interest is attached to the 


I 43 | 


life and letters of Patin from the light 
thrown by them on various political, econo- 
mic, and social concerns in France during 
his lifetime. His letters, in addition to their 
personal characteristics afford a mine of 
information to the student of French social 
history during the seventeenth century. 
The teaching of medicine at Paris was for a 
long time in the hands of the ecclesiastics, 
and there was no distinct Faculté or 
Collége for that purpose at the University 
of Paris until 1281. From that date the 
Ecole or Faculté de Médecine forms an en- 
tity, and had Its own corporate existence in 
the university body. 

Wickersheimer? in his most interesting 
book on the history of medicine in France 
in the sixteenth century writes of the 
changes of location the college under- 
went as it grew in Importance with the 
increase of its students, and gradually 
eclipsed its ancient rival, the Medical 
School of Montpellier. At the present time 
all that remains to recall its former locality 
to those who search for its traces 1s to be 
found in the names still retained by some 
of the small streets remaming on the left 


27a médecine et les médecins en France 4 |’épo- 
que de la Renaissance, Paris, 1916. 


1 44 | 


bank of the Seme, near the Pont St. Michel, 
the rue de La Bicherie, the rue de Fouarre, 
etc., the latter so called from the straw on 
which the students used to sit. Yet the 
grand buildings of the present Medical 
School and its adjuncts are in the immediate 
neighborhood, and in walking through the 
rue des Ecoles or some of the other new 
streets, we can realize that for eight hundred 
years the region has been the home of 
successive generations of medical teachers 
and students, and some of the old buildings, 
such as the church of Saint Severin or the 
church of Saint Julien-le-Pauvre, though 
in such a changed environment, remain as 
monuments of the historic past. In former 
times religious observances formed a promi- 
nent part in the life of the medical school 
at Paris. It was preeminently Catholic, 
losing no opportunity to express its devo- 
tion to the Faith, expelling from its ranks 
thosesuspected of heresy, and during the wars 
of the League recognizing, under the name of 
Charles x, the old Cardinal of Bourbon as 
King of France in opposition to Henri tv. 
There were many church services which both 
teachers and students were bound to attend. 

The term, Faculté de Médecine, did not 
imply a few professors or teachers of 


1 45 | 


medicine, but a corporate body of physi- 
cians under the control of which was 
placed the medical teaching of the Univer- 
sity, and the control of the practice of 
medicine in the city of Paris. There were 
similar faculties elsewhere in France, at 
Montpellier, Bordeaux, Toulouse, Orleans, 
Bourges, and many other cities, all possess- 
ing locally the same privileges as regarded 
the exercise of their profession. 

The most aged member of the Faculté, 
known as the Ancient, became solely by 
nature of his age, an object of respectful 
veneration on the part of his colleagues. 
He recetved double the usual amount of 
fees or honoraria due to members of the 
Faculté on the occasion of examinations 
or other functions, and in case of the inca- 
pacity of the Dean from any cause, the 
Ancient had the right to convoke an 
assembly of the doctors. The executive 
chief of the Faculté was the Doyen or Dean, 
elected for a term of two years. This was 
a busy and important position. Besides 
presiding at the meetings of the Faculté, 
he was present at examinations of students 
for the various degrees and the readings 
of the theses. The Dean likewise presided 
at the examination of those who presented 


| 46 | 

themselves for the right to practice as 
surgeons and apothecaries, over both of 
which bodies the Faculté de Médecine had 
control. He inspected at intervals the 
shops of all the apothecaries in Paris to 
ascertain that they obeyed the laws regu- 
lating their traffic and that the drugs they 
kept and sold were pure. He had control of 
the financial affairs of the Faculté, was the 
guardian of its seal, and especially of its 
interests when the Parlement of Paris or 
any other court or power attempted to 
infringe upon its rights. As Dean he was one 
of the governing body of the University 
and a member of the Parlement of Paris. 

Upon the death of a King of France the 
Ancient and the Dean were both required 
to attend the autopsy on the defunct, and 
Itkewise his funeral, clad in their official 
robes of scarlet with caps of the same color. 

The title of docteur-régent, which Littré 
in his dictionary says applied to one who 
instructed publicly, appertained to all mem- 
bers of the Faculté, and until 1505 the 
function of teaching was performed by 
any member who felt called upon to do so. 
In 1505 two teaching chairs were estab- 
lished, and thenceforth many of the doc- 
teurs-régents never actually taught classes, 


‘l 47 | 


although the professors only held the chairs 
for two years at a time and all members 
of the Faculté were eligible for election if 
they desired to become candidates. All 
the docteurs-régents continued to take part 
in the examinations and readings of the 
theses. 

The greatest honor which could befall 
a physician of the Faculté de Médecine de 
Paris was to be elected its Dean, and this 
honor fell to the lot of Patin on two occa- 
sions, it being practically the invariable 
custom to re-elect a Dean at the end of 
his first term. Although Patin, in the years 
before the choice fell on him, assumes to 
belittle the position and pretends that it 
is an honor which he does not desire, it is 
easy to see from the change in his tone, 
after elevation to the position, that it had 
long been an object of ambition for him. 

In a letter to Spon (November 24, 1642) 
Patin relates how near he came to being 
chosen. The election of a dean was quite a 
complicated affair. One was held every 
two years, on the first Saturday after All 
Saints’ Day. The Faculté met in solemn 
conclave. The Dean whose term was ending 
read a report of the period during which 
he had held office. The names of all the 


| 48 | 
doctors present were then written on sepa- 
rate ballots, and those of the junior doctors 
deposited in one urn, and those of the senior 
doctors in another. The Dean shook the 
ballots up and then drew two from among 
the juniors, and three from among the 
seniors. [The five doctors thus chosen by lot 
took an oath to designate the most worthy 
for the position of Dean. They retired to the 
Chapel, where they chose three names by a 
majority vote, two seniors and one junior. 
Three tickets bearing these names were 
placed in a hat and the Dean drew one of 
them from it, and the happy owner of it 
became Dean for the ensuing two years. 
Patin tells Spon that his name “danced in 
the hat”’ with those of Messieurs Perreau 
and de la Vigne but that “‘the lot 1s always 
contrary to me,”’ and Monsieur de la Vigne 
won the election. Writing to Belin, fils,® 
(November 16, 1652) Patin says that he 
has sent him the jeton, or medal, struck by 
order of the Faculté in honor of his decanate. 
These jetons were always struck to com- 


3 ‘The Belins, with whom Patin corresponded, were 
a father and son each named Claude who practiced 
medicine at Troyes, where there were also several 
other physicians of the same family. Their names 
are preserved solely in the correspondence of Patin. 


‘| 49 | 


memorate the elevation of a Dean of the 
Faculty. In the ANNats oF Mepicat His- 
TORY* a number of them including that of 
Patin, are reproduced from the numismatic 
collection of the Army Medical Library at 
Washington, with a most interesting descrip- 
tion of them by Dr. Albert Alleman. 





Jeton of Guy Patin 


Patin writes to Falconet (June 28, 1652): 


The custom is to put the arms of the Dean on 
one side and those of the Faculté on the other. 
I have retained the latter, but instead of putting 
those of my family which are gules with a gold 
chevron, accompanied by two gold stars en 
chef, and a hand pointing in gold, I have put my 
portrait. The engraver, skilful as he ts, has not 
caught the resemblance very well, especially 
the eye, but there is no remedy. 


Patin’s greatest object in life was the 
preservation and if possible extension of 
4New York, 1917. 1, ul, 156,157. 


‘| 50 F 

the privileges and authority of the Faculté 
de Médecine de Paris. Page after page of 
his correspondence is devoted to this theme 
and he constantly speaks with pride, in 
his letters to the Belins at Troyes, to 
Spon at Lyons, or to other doctors in the 
provinces, of the glory of the Faculté and 
of the proofs which it gives from time to 
time of Its strength in Its various contests 
with the apothecaries, the surgeons or 
other enemies who strove to encroach on 
Its prerogatives. Thus he writes in February, 
1558, that he has seen in the coffers of the 
Faculté, a royal decree entitled “‘Nouvelle 
confirmation de Il’an 1132.” He adds a 
disquisition on the powers possessed by the 
Dean, he is “the master of the schools, 
he has all the keys; fourteen handsome 
registers, all the records, and all the money, 
of which he renders an exact account every 
year, he is vindex disciplinae et custos legum. 
Our statutes call him caput Facultatis.” 

He consoles himself for his defeat, by 
the reflection that the honor is accompanied 
by ‘“‘a very heavy and very difficult respon- 
sibility.”’ Writing to Falconet (November 
4, 1650) he says: “I have been an elector 
many times, I have even been chosen 
and put in the hat three times, and each 


| 51 | 

of the three I have remained at the bottom 
of the hat, and if ever they put me im it 
again, I shall not be vexed to remain there.” 

The lot finally proved favorable to Patin 
and on November 54, 1650, he was elected 
Dean. Although he affects to speak some- 
what deprecatingly at times, saying, “I 
have already enough business without this,” 
nevertheless much more frequently his 
pride mn the position pours forth. On 
December 1, 1650, he gave the customary 
banquet to the members of the Faculté, 
and he writes to Falconet the next day that 
thirty-six of his colleagues had enjoyed his 
hospitality : 


I never saw so much laughing and drinking by © 
serious men, and even our ancients; It was the 
best wine of Bordeaux which I had chosen for 
the feast. I entertained them in my chamber 
where over the hangings were displayed the 
pictures of Erasmus, the two Scaligers, father 
and son, Casaubon, Muret, Montaigne, Char- 
ron, Grotius, Heinsius, Saumaise, Fernel, de 
Thou, and our good friend M. G. Naudé, 
librarian for Mazarin . . . there were yet 
three other portraits of excellent men, of the 
late M. de Sales, bishop of Geneva, M., the 
bishop de Bellay, my good friend; Justus 
Lipsius, and finally Francois Rabelais, for which 


| 52 } 
one has offered to give me twenty pistoles. 
What say you to this assemblage? Were not 
my guests in good company? 


Writing to Spon (March 6, 1656): 


When I shall receive your picture I will put 
it in a good place with Fernel, Ellain, Duport, 
Seguin, Marescot, Nicolas Pietre, the late M. 
Riolan, André du Laurens, the late M. Gas- 
sendi, Salmasius, Heinsius, Grotius, Naudaeus, 
Muret, Buchanan, the two Scaligers, Lipstus, 
Thuanus (de Thou), Crassot, Passerat, Campa- 
nella, Fra Paolo Sarpi, Casaubon, the Chancel- 
lor de Hopital, P. Charron, Michel de Mon- 
taigne; the French author otherwise named 
Rabelais, the divine Erasmus, etc.°® 


In the letter quoted above, writing to 
Belin, fils (January 14, 1651) Patin says: 


I should tell you that our Faculté made me 
Dean the fifth of last November, a charge to which 
I had been elected and named four other times; 
it is difficult and takes much time, but it is 
honorable. . . . My wife says there is much 
good fortune for the end of the year, her hus- 
band, Dean, her eldest son, doctor, and a good 
house which she greatly wished for. 


> Pic publishes as an addendum to his Guy Patin 
the pictures of all those who figured in Patin’s 
gallery. 


| 53 | 


Patin’s pride in the Faculté de Médecine 
is well expressed in a letter® in which he 
says: 


All individual men die, but associations do not 
die. The most powerful man in the last one 
hundred years in Europe without being a 
crowned head, was the Cardinal Richelieu. He 
made the whole earth tremble, he caused terror 
at Rome; he treated rudely and shook the 
King of Spain, and nevertheless he was not 
able to make us receive into our company the 
two sons of the Gazetteer (Renaudot) who 
were licensed but who will not be doctors for 
a long time. 


No one could have had a higher idea of 
the powers of the Dean than Patin and once, 
at least, he got himself into trouble by an 
undue exercise of them. Doctor Pic gives 
the story with some additional information 
supplied by the researches of his friend, 
M. Delalain. Jean Chartier, a docteur- 
régent, published without the approval of 
the Faculté de Médecine, a book on anti- 
mony. Patin removed his name from the 
list of docteurs-régents, and Chartier ap- 
pealed to Parlement for reinstatement. 
The court of the Parlement rendered its 


6 Letter to Spon, December 6, 1644. 


| 54 } 

judgment, July 15, 1653, in favor of 
Chartier and ordered that he should be 
reinstated as docteur-régent; that Patin 
should pay him 48 livres parisis in amend, 
all the expenses of his reinstatement, and 
two-thirds of the costs of the trial, the 
other one-third to be paid by the other 
docteurs-régents, Germain Hureau and 
Daniel Arbinet, who had acted with Patin 
in the matter; and these three were enjoined 
from any act or word mimterfering with 
Chartier in the future enjoyment of the 
rights and privileges of his position in the 
Faculté de Médecine. 

He tells Belin he has a copy of all the 
names and surnames of the licentiates and 
doctors according to their order of passing 
at the Ecole de Paris for more than three 
centuries, with all the memorable events in 
the Faculté. In a letter to Belin, fils (Jan- 
uary, 1651) he tells of a book written by 
M. Moreau, “De antiquitate facultatis 
medicae Parisiensis,’ which is not yet 
published and he fears will not be because 
of the ill health of Moreau, but which 
would be very curious and beautiful. He 
tried to secure all the biographical details 
possible about the lives of those who 
had been physicians at Paris. He writes 


455 | 


to Spon (December 30, 1650): “There 
is scarcely a bachelor or a licentiate, much 
less a doctor of our schools for upward of 
three hundred years of whom I cannot tell 
something, even if only a Iittle.”’ 

In a letter of the same date (December 
30, 1650) to Falconet he tells him how he 
had recovered some of the old registers of 
the Faculté which had disappeared: 


An honest friend of mine, knowing that I had 
been elected Dean of our Faculté in the place of 
M. Jean Pietre, the 5th of last November, has 
placed in my hands an old register of our 
Schools, in abridged characters almost Gothic, 
from the year 1390, in which is noted every two 
years the number of doctors and of licentiates. 

Those of the doctors are sometimes fifteen, 
twenty, twenty-five, going even to forty. I lent 
it to M. Riolan who found in it the mention of 
an honest man who left by will a manuscript 
of Galen which he had, de usu partium. This 
legacy dates from the year 1009, and is of 
further consequence because it proves against 
those who would doubt it, that in that year 
and before it, there was a Faculté de Médecine 
at Paris. 


A curious feature in the medical life 
of the seventeenth century can be found in 
a study of the family relationship which 


1 56 | 

prevailed among the great men of the pro- 
fession, constituting veritable dynasties, 
in whose hands were held the great prefer- 
ments and choicest clientele. The Riolans, 
Pietres, Moreaus, Seguins and many others 
might be adduced as interesting instances. 

Jean Riolan, the elder, transmitted his 
fame and position to his son, Jean. The 
elder Riolan’s wife was Anne Pietre, daughter 
of the first Stmon Pietre. Charles Bouvard, 
first physician to Louis x11 and _ super- 
intendent of the Jardin des Plantes, was 
a brother-in-law of Riolan, and Bouvard’s 
daughter married Jacques Cousinot, first 
physician to Louis xiv. Thus it will be 
seen that Bouvard, the Riolans and Cousi- 
not were connected with the Pietres, the 
most prominent medical family in Paris 
for a period of many years. The first of the 
family of Pietre to become prominent in 
medical affairs was Simon Pietre (14525- 
1584). He was a Huguenot, and his life 
was saved during the Massacre of St. 
Bartholomew by his son-in-law, Riolan, 
who concealed him im the abbey of St. 
Victor. In spite of his religion he was made 
physician to Charles 1x by Catherine de’ 
Medici. Curiously, Ambroise Paré, also 
accused of Huguenotism (perhaps secretly 





JEAN RIOLAN, THE YOUNGER 
(1577-1657) 


i 


THE LIBRARY 
ge URE 
UAVERSITY OF (LUNOIS 


-* a 





se 


a Huguenot) was also favored by Catherine 
and was first surgeon to Charles rx. The 
first Simon Pietre’s son, also named Simon 
(1465-1618), married the daughter of the 
celebrated physician Marescot. He _ suc- 
ceeded Gourmelen, the infamous enemy 
of Ambroise Paré, as professor of medicine 
at the Collége Royal. Another son of old 
Simon, named Nicolas, was a distinguished 
physician, and his son Jean had a very large 
practice and was esteemed a most learned 
physician. There were five doctors of the 
same family who figured largely m the med- 
ical profession at Paris during the seven- 
teenth century under the name of Akakia, 
a Greek version of their real family name, 
Sans-Malice. One of them, Martin Akakia, 
was a brother-in-law of one of the Seguins 
and succeeded him as Professeur du Roi at 
Paris. Patin says that he resigned his chair 
in 1654, after having held it for many years 
without daring to give a public lecture. 

There were also three or four Moreaus 
and equal numbers of Seguins who shared 
or transmitted their various dignities among 
one another. 

Whatever may be thought of the narrow- 
ness or ultra-conservatism of the Faculté de 
Médecine in Patin’s time it should in justice 


‘| 58 | 

be conceded that it attempted to place 
medical education on a higher plane. Patin 
writes to Belin (July 29, 1654) that in 
some cities anyone who claimed to have a 
medical degree could settle and practice 
medicine, but in Paris and in other places 
those who wished to practice had to undergo 
an examination to ascertain their abilities 
no matter from whence they had graduated, 
“and this rigor is not without benefit 
for the purpose of remedymg the abuse 
which ts heaped upon many of the Irttle 
universities and even upon the larger ones 
that sometimes give doctors’ degrees too 
easily for money.” 

In spite of the fact that Patin never 
became, in the strict sense of the term, one 
of the physicians to the court, his letters 
are full of references to medical matters 
connected with the court, and of tales of 
those physicians whom the king delighted 
to honor. 

From the tone of many of these, one can- 
not but feel that there was considerable 
personal animus and chagrin at his exclu- 
sion from their midst, but it 1s impossible to 
imagine Guy in the role of a courtier, and in 
the long run perhaps it was as well for his 
happiness that he did not achieve court 


iN 


distinction. In order that some of the 
references in his letters may be rendered 
less obscure, it is as well to pause for a 
moment to glance at the organization of 
the court physicians, that we may realize 
some of the responsibilities and emoluments 
incumbent on them. 

The medical service at the court of France 
during the seventeenth century was organ- 
ized on the same lavish scale as all the other 
services of the Maison du Rot. Positions 
In It were eagerly sought after and were 
frequently sold for very high prices. Thus 
Patin writes Spon (May 3, 1650) that 
Seguin who had seven years before paid 
Guillemeau 40,000 livres for the succession 
to his place as médecin ordinaire du ro1, had 
in turn sold the succession to de Ia Chambre 
for 22,000 écus, and he writes to Falconet 
(July 5, 1652) of the death of Vautier: 


He (Vautier) was premier médecin du roi and 
the last of the kmgdom im capacity, and in order 
that you should know that he is not dead with- 
out cause, he took antimony thrice, that he 
might die m his method, by the consent and 
advice of Guénault. If he had died seven years 
ago he would have saved the lives of many 
honest men who have been killed by his anti- 
mony. At length he is dead himself aged fifty- 


«| 60 > 


three years. As he was reported to be very 
ignorant even at Court he wished to have the 
reputation of possessing chemical secrets and ~ 
of excelling in the preparation of antimony. 
Some courtiers applauded him or seemed to 
do so. The authority of his charge sustained his 
credit. He said among other things that the 
physicians of Paris were right to say that anti- 
mony was a poison, but that as he prepared it, 
it was not; nevertheless this good preparation 
failed him. It is a place vacant for which Cardi- 
nal Mazarin expects (cherche) three thousand 
pistoles, there is one of my colleagues who 
says that they have offered it to Guénault at 
that price, but that he refused it, but that he 
believes that Valot will give them. Thus all is 
for sale, even to the health of the king which ts a 
very bad example. 


At the head of the medical service there 
was the premier médecin, the first physician 
to the king. He was one of the grand 
officers of the crown, a member of the coun- 
cil of state, and ennobled by virtue of his 
position, bearing a coat of arms. He 
received a large salary and many perquisites, 
such as we know Fernel, physician to Henri 
11 received at the birth of each of the chil- 
dren of his royal master. Of course, in 
consequence of his office, he was sure of a 
large clientele among the nobility. He had 


J 61 I 

authority over all the physicians, surgeons, 
apothecaries, dentists, etc., who aided him 
in guarding the health of the royal person, 
judging as to their qualifications for their 
respective appointments, and assuring him- 
self that they fulfilled their duties properly. 
He was required to be in attendance each 
morning when the king arose, and to exer- 
cise an active supervision over the king’s 
diet and regimen. If the king was ill the 
first physician had chief care of the case 
and direction of its management, presiding 
at all consultations and carefully observing 
the results of the medicmes or remedies 
administered to him. It was his duty to 
accompany the king on any journey he 
might make, and he had to take up his 
residence at whatever chateau or place the 
court might lodge. 

Associated with him were eight physi- 
cians in ordinary, or as they were generally 
termed, physicians by quarter, because 
of the division of their terms of service in 
attendance by quarters of the year. Two of 
them were required to be in attendance at 
the court for three months in each year. 
During that time they slept near the king, 
attended the rising and retirement of the 
king, and were present at his meals. The 


J 62 } 


constant supervision of the meat and drink 
of the king was necessary not only in order 
to see that it was properly prepared, but also 
to guard against the danger of an attempt 
to poison the monarch. 

There were many instances of the appoint- 
ment of additional physicians to the king. 
These received their appointments generally 
by their successful management of some 
patient belonging to the royal family, rarely 
because of any especially distinguished 
standing in the profession. Undoubtedly — 
many of the court physicians owed their 
positions to some lucky chance or to the 
backing of influential friends, while on the 
other hand, many were appointed because 
by their merit they had obtained a reputa- 
tion for skill. Thus Ambroise Paré’s appoint- 
ment as chief surgeon was due to the recog- 
nition of his skill by those whom he had 
treated in the wars. 

Patin tells Belm (October 28, 1631) that 
Senelles, one of the king’s physicians, had 
been tried for casting a horoscope of the 
king and predicting his death. He and 
another of the king’s physicians, Duval, 
who was concerned with him in the matter, 
were sentenced to the galleys for life and 
their property confiscated. 


| 63 | 
Again writing to him in 1645, he says 
that Louis xv is ill at Fontainebleau with 
a continued fever, he has been bled from the 
arms and one foot. The fever developed 
after he had been taken by his physicians 
to drink the waters at Forges. 


God knows for what reason they should make 
a young prince of seventeen years drink those 
lye waters when m as good a state of health as 
was the king. It has been long that princes 
have been unfortunate in their physicians. I 
wish with all my heart that God sends him 
good health, and that they do not give him 
antimony. Note that in all the court there is 
not a good physician. 


Writing again (March 14, 1657) he 
reiterates his views: 


The great are unfortunate in their physicians. 
The chief number of the court physicians are 
ignorant or charlatans, and often both the one 
and other. 


The premier chirurgien or first surgeon 
to the king, was assisted by eight surgeons 
in ordinary, or by quarter. His office was 
subordinate to that of the premier médecin, 
and his duties not quite so onerous. 

The court physician had no easy task. 
Louis xiv would not let Fagon use the 


‘| 64 | 

word “‘order’”’ (ordonnance) when prescrib- 
ing for him, and Louis xv reprimanded his 
physician when he told him “it was neces- 
sary” (il faut) that he should do or take 
something. When Senac was ~ appointed 
médecin du rot in 1752, he had Fizes 
appointed to the position of physician to the 
duc d’Orléans which he had previously held. 
Senac gave Fizes some advice as to the 
behavior he should adopt towards his 
noble patient: 


I told him to approach his patient gravely, to 
feel his pulse, make him put out his tongue, gaze 
seriously in the basin (urinal or else bowl in 
which the blood had been drawn); not to speak, 
but to shroud himself in his peruke, and remain 
thus a moment with his eyes closed, then to 
give his orders, and go away without thinking - 
to make his reverence. Instead of that, my 
imbecile jabbered like a magpie; he talked 
politics and literature, saying, “Your serene 
highness”” every minute. He only got what he 
merited, and that 1s what should happen to all 
those who do not listen to their elders. Fizes 
was discharged within a month after he had been 
appointed. 


When Louis xiv came to the throne, 
Cousinot held the position of first physician. 


‘1 65 | 
Patin writes Charles Spon (December 6, 
1644) about the intrigues which were on 
foot to secure the position for Vautier. 
The latter had been physician to Marie de’ 
Medici. In 1630 he had been sent to the 
Bastille where he had remained for twelve 
years, probably because of participation in 
the intrigues of the Queen Mother. In 1644 
he was physician-in-ordinary to Cardinal 
Mazarin. Patin writes that Cardinal Riche- 
lieu had never dared put his physician, 
Citois, in the position of physician to the 
King, fearing that it would rouse suspicions 
against him. He thinks that for that reason, 
if for no other Vautier would never receive 
the appointment. Also Anne of Austria, the 
Queen Mother, who was regent for Louis x1v, 
esteemed Cousinot and did not wish to have 
him ousted. Vautier ultimately received the 
appointment of first physician to Louis xiv. 
Patin writes Spon (May 29, 1648) that 
Vautier had complained to a friend of his 
that he was dissatisfied with his income 
and wished to obtain another benefice. 
The friend pointed out to Vautier that he 
should be content as he recetved 25,000 écus 
from this position, besides what he made 
from his practice at Court, and the revenue 
he recetved from an abbey, and that 


J 66 } 


having already this benefice he should not 
seek to obtain further revenues from the 
Church. Vautier replied that he did not 
feel his conscience charged nor his soul 
in danger for the benefice he held and that 
he would not be damned any quicker for 
three abbeys than for one. 

Mazarm had had his favorite Valot 
appointed médecin du roi, when the King 
was sick with a malarial fever, or possibly ty- 
phoid. Patin writes Spon (October 19, 1655): 


The Queen has refused Valot permission to 
bring physicians to Fontainebleau to consult 
with him, and treat the king. He had named 
A. Daquin and Veson to her. She answered in 
anger: “I doubt the choice which you would 
make. These are fine physicians for the King! 
I do not agree with you. I wish to have Guénault 
who treated him once when he had small- 
pox.’’ Guénault was sent for and is there. One 
holds that Valot is in danger of being discharged, 
although he has not yet touched any money 
since the three years that he payed to enter 
there; at least he is in great danger of it if the 
Cardinal does not maintain him and put him 
back in the good graces of the King and Queen, 
with whom he stands very badly. 


A few days later Patin writes that he 
had been at a consultation with Riolan and 
Moreau, in the course of which they had 


| 67 | 

told him that the King had called Valot 
an ignoramus and charlatan and the Queen 
had treated him with great rudeness but 
that Mazarin backed him up. Sometime 
before the King’s illness a son of Valot’s 
had died and Valot had asked the King to 
bestow a benefice which he had held on 
another of his sons, but the King had 
refused. The Queen sent for Guénault 
to come and see the King but Mazarin 
sent him back to Paris. A little later, in 
November, Patin tells Spon that Mazarin 
has abandoned the cause of Valot, in turn 
calling him an ignoramus and a charlatan 
and saying that he was the cause of the 
King’s illness. 

Moliére’s epigram on the death of Henrt- 
etta Maria, the Queen of England, sister 
of Louis x11, under the care of Valot might 
be recalled: 


Le croiriez vous, race future, 

Que la fille du grand Henri 

Eut en mourant méme aventure 
Que fut son pére et son mari? 
Tous trois sont morts par assasin, 
Ravaillac, Cromwell, médecin; 
Henri, d’un coup de baionette, 
Charles fini sur son billot, 

Et maintenant meure Henriette, 
Par l’ignorance de Valot. 


{ 68 } 


On March 23, 1663, Patin in a long letter 
to Falconet sums up a great deal of informa- 
tion about the court physicians of his time, 
getting his knowledge from a book which 
Bouvard had written and proposed to 
publish. Before doing so he had submitted 
copies of the manuscript to Moreau and 
Patin and to his father-in-law, Riolan. 
The latter advised Moreau not to publish 
the book as he would incur the enmity not 
only of Valot and Vautier but also of 
Cardinal Mazarin. Bouvard thereupon got 
Moreau and Patin to give him back the 
manuscripts he had submitted to them. 
Patin quotes his recollections of what 
Bouvard had written and of conversations 
he had had with him on the subject of the 
court physicians. Bouvard told him that 
once he had talked to Louis xm1 about 
Héroard, Guullemeau and Vautier and that 
the King had said: “I, also, am unfortunate 
to have been in the hands of so many 
charlatans.” Héroard was a good courtier 
with a thirst for riches. He got enmeshed 
in the troubles of the Queen Mother, 
Marie de’ Medici, and Richelieu stopped 
his further progress at the Court. Vautier 
was a miserable Jew of Avignon, very 
boastful and ignorant. He was the physician 


| 69 | 
and friend of the Queen Mother and 
was implicated with the Marillacs in their 
designs against Richelieu. 

On the famous Journée des Dupes, 
November 11, 1630, when Richelieu over- 
threw their conspiracy, Vautier was ar- 
rested and passed nearly twelve years in the 
Bastille. When Mazarin came into power 
during the regency of Anne of Austria, 
Vautier was appointed first physician to 
the King. Patin says that this same Vautier 
was used by Mazarin as a spy at the Court. 


CHAPTER IV 


HomE LIFE AND LITERARY INTERESTS 
HOME LIFE 


Patin soon achieved sufficient practice — 
to give him a very comfortable position mn 
life. He speaks with pardonable pride of 
his possessions. Writing to Belin (May 1, 
1630) he says: “I have in this city two 
things of which I can boast, good books and 
good friends, which are at your service.” 
And again writing to Belin, fils, m January, 
1651, he states: 


Furthermore I have purchased a fine house, 
in which I have dwelt now for three days. It 
is situated in the Place du Chevalier du Guet, 
en belle vue, and away from noise. . . . I 
have a fine, large, vast study in which I hope 
to place my 10,000 books by adding to it a little 
chamber which is on the same floor. My friends 
say I am the best lodged man in Paris. 


He writes to both Spon and Falconet about 

his removal to his new house but dwells 

chiefly on the pleasure it gives him to have 

his books so well lodged. He describes 
[ 70 | 


ZAM g 
the arrangement of his study in a letter 
to Falconet (April 24, 1651): 


I assure you it is beautiful. I have put on the 
mantle of the chimney a beautiful picture of a 
crucifix which a painter that I had had cut (for 
stone) had given me in 1627. On either side of 
the good God are both of us, the master and the 
mistress; under the crucifix are the portraits of 
Frasmus and J. Scaliger. . . . Besides the orna- 
ments which are on my chimney, there is in the 
middle of my library a large beam, which passes 
from one end to the other on each side of which 
there are a dozen pictures of illustrious men, 
having thus plenty of light from the opposite 
windows, so that I am in good company with 
good illumination. 


He writes of his method of moving his 
books,! “All my folios are moved and 
arranged in their places, there are already 
more than sixteen hundred in order. We 
have commenced to move the quartos 
after which will follow the octavos, and 
thus to the end of the procession which will 
last yet a month.” 

No wonder such a booklover could write 
his friend Spon (August, 1658) seven 
years later: “I hold myself more fortunate 
at home with my books and a little leisure, 

1 Letter to Charles Spon, January, 1651. 


| 72 | 
than Mazarin with all his écus and im- 
quietudes.”’ 

Patin evidently enjoyed comparing his 
state with that of the detested Mazarin, 
for he writes Falconet (February 28, 1640) 
that he had been told on good authority 
that Mazarm thought of going mto retire- 
ment, adding that, however that might be, 
“TI esteem myself a thousand times happier 
than he, being enclosed in good company 
with my silent masters, while I hear the danc- 
ing and violins at my neighbors who are 
rejoicing in the carnival and would not 
believe 1t was caréme if they did not play 
the fool all these days of feasting.”’ 

Some years later he gives Falconet (No- 
vember 8, 1658) a pleasant picture of the 
way he spent his evenings with his two 
illustrious neighbors, M. Miron, président 
aux enquétes and M. Charpentier, con- 
seiller aux requétes: 


Our conversation is always gay. If we talk 
of religion or of the State it is only historically 
without dreaming of reformation or sedition. 
We talk to one another about things as they are. 
Our principal conversation regards literature, of 
that which is new, worth consideration and 
useful. The mind thus refreshed I return to my 
house, where after some mmtercourse with my 


{| 73 | | 
books, or an urgent consultation, I seek sleep 
in my bed, which is without falsehood, as said 
our grand Fernel, according to the tragic 
Seneca, pars humanae melior. I seldom sup 
out of my house, only occasionally, with M. de 
Lamoignon, premier president. 


The book-lover Patin complains to Belin 
(September, 1646) that it has been necessary 
for him to make three journeys from Paris, 
one into Beauce, one to Rouen, and another 
into Normandy: 


However-so-much I love the sedentary life 
and not to go away from Paris, because of my 
- books. If I did not know myself well I would 
say of myself what an old surgeon of Paris said 
of himself ‘‘that he was persecuted by too much 
practice because he was too skilfula man.”. . . 
These journeys were as displeasing to me as they 
were necessary for those for whom I made them, 
and they moreover were extremely incommod- 
ing to me. 


There is no indication that Patin ever 
left his beloved Paris for any length of time. 
He writes to Charles Spon (March 13, 
1648) about a projected journey on which 
he proposed to go first to Lyons to visit 
him, thence to Geneva, from there to Bale, 


‘| 74 F 


to visit the famous anatomist Bauhin and 
the tomb of the great Erasmus. Then he 
proposed to go to Nuremberg, where Vol- 
ckamer would introduce him to Gaspard 
Hoffmann. In returning he would visit his 
brother at Nimegue and some of the 
cities of Holland, to wit; the Hague, Leiden, 
Amsterdam, Rotterdam, and Dordrecht. 
At Rotterdam he would seek out the birth- 
place of the ““‘mcomparable Erasmus” and 
at Leiden he wished to visit with devout 
respect the tomb of the “very great man, 
Joseph Scaliger.”’ His eldest son, Robert, 
was to accompany him on the trip. For 
some reason, probably the uncertain state 
of the various countries through which 
he would travel, the plan was given up. 
In a letter to Spon (June 13, 1644) Patin 
says that five years after receiving his 
doctor’s degree he took a wife “from whom 
I will have in direct succession 20,000 écus, 
her father and mother yet living but very 
old, with one collateral (relative) a sister 
who has no children and ts very rich. God 
has blessed my alliance with four sons, to wit 
Robert, Charles, Pierrot and Francois.” 
Patin- also owned a county house of 
which he wrote Belin, fils, July 5, 1651: 
‘““My wife and children are in the country 


175 | 


at three leagues from here, in a handsome 
house, which I bought for fifteen thousand 
livres.”’ 


LITERARY INTERESTS 


Patin’s intense interest in the history 
and literature of his profession is manifest 
throughout all his life. He begins his 
correspondence with Belin (in 1630, aged 
twenty-nine) by telling him that he is 
trying to make a collection of all the theses 
read at the medical school in Paris and asks 
him for copies of those which he could not 
obtain at Paris and thought Belin might 
have at Troyes, written by Belin’s contem- 
poraries at Paris. 

Patin had also the most lively mterest 
in general literature. In 1637 there was 
published an edition of the Latin addresses 
pronounced by Jean Passerat, one of the 
authors of the “Satire Ménippée” and 
professor of eloquence and Latin poetry 
in the Collége Royal, with a preface by 
Guy Patin. In addition to writing to his 
friends the news about all the latest medical 
books and editions, he writes of works on 
law, theology, philosophy, literature and 
history, rejoicing in new editions of Vosstus, 
Lipsius, Casaubon, Scaliger, Grottus, etc. 


{76 | 

Patin was a veritable bibliomaniac and 
occasionally his conscience seems to have 
smitten him for the constant importunities 
with which he beset his friends. Thus he 
writes? to one of them: ‘Pardon me the 
many importunities which I make to you 
because of my bibliomania, it is a sickness 
of which I cannot cure myself this year; 
perhaps I will amend next year.” 

He also admits that his studious habits 
injured his health. He says*: “I occupy 
myself so much with my books, of which 
I purchase a new one nearly every day, that 
I pass with them all the day and the night, 
but these vigils have injured my health so 
much, that to reestablish it I have had to 
almost abandon my studies. This is one of 
the obligations that I owe to medicine, 
without the succour of which I would 
undoubtedly have killed myself in my 
desire to become too learned.”’ 

In 1668 Patin published the “Apologia 
pro Galeno,” written by Gaspard Hoffmann, 
who died in 1648. Patin purchased the 
manuscript after Hoffmann’s death. He 
dedicated the book to his friend, President 
Lamoignon. 


2 Letter to Charles Spon, January 11, 1655. 
3 Letter to Falconet, September 19, 1659. 


ide 


Patin not only collected and read books 
but he was an active factor in stimulating 
the publication of new works and of new 
editions of those which were difficult to 
obtain or which in his opinion were suitable 
for republication in improved form. With 
this object In view he was constantly im- 
porting books from Holland, Germany or 
Italy, lending rare manuscripts or tomes to 
publishers, and writing to procure such 
material from sources where he thought it 
might be obtamed. And his zeal extended 
to other fields than those of his profession. 
Thus we find him writmg (April 1, 1657) 
to M. de Tournes, a bookseller, offering 
his aid in publishing various books. Writing 
to Belin (August 2, 1640): “Ifever you come 
across the Volume of Epistles by Erasmus 
in folio, the thickness of three big fingers 
(because there are others that are smaller), 
purchase it boldly; it is a book worth its 
weight in gold.”’ Patin contemplated getting 
out a work on practice of his own, a ‘‘ Metho- 
dus” or manual, and wrote to Spon (July 
13, 1649) about the plan he proposed to 
follow, but which he never carried out. 

In writing to Belin (November 4, 1631) 
Patin, speaking of the last edition of 
Pareé’s works, says: “The Pare of the last 


1798 

impression, well bound, costs eight livres, 
without any rebate. It Is augmented in 
this last (edition) by a new treatise on 
fevers, which has been added at the end 
of the book, and Is written by a physician 
intus et in cute mihi noto, without having 
put his name to it, which tis very good.” 
Triaire believes it very probable that the 
anonymous physician, whose “name was 
very good” and whom Patin knew so well, 
was none other than Guy himself. 

Writing to Spon (June 11, 1649) Patin 
after stating that Paré had decried the use 
of unicorn’s horn and other Arabesque 
remedies, adds: “Do not think of rejecting 
the opinion of Paré under cover that he 
was only a surgeon. The author of his book 
was a learned physician of Paris, named 
Master Jean Hautin (Altinus),- who died 
here, one of our ancients, m the year 1614.” 
This repeats an accusation made by Le 
Paulmier, Riolan and others that the works 
appearing under the name of Paré were not 
really written by the Father of French 
surgery, but by others. Malgaigne* in the 
Introduction to his definitive edition of the 
writings of Paré has proved convincingly 
the falsity of such statements, and shown 

4Oeuvres complétes d’Ambroise Paré. Paris, 1840. | 


‘L 79 | 


beyond cavil that Paré never put forth a 
line of which he was not the veritable 
author. Patin possibly was misled by his 
admiration for Riolan to share the views 
which the animosity of the latter towards 
Paré caused him to propagate. 

Patin translated into Latin and published 
with notes the works of André du Laurens 
(1538-1609), premier physician to Marie 
de’ Medici, and after the death of Marescot, 
to Henri tv. 


RELIGIOUS BELIEF 


Patin was not openly a Huguenot but 
had strong sympathies with them and he 
was certainly not a very strict Catholic. 
He read many Huguenot works on theology. 
He frequently expresses admiration for 
Arnauld and other Jansenists. Thus he 
writes Spon (March 3, 1656): ““The Jansen- 
ists are badly and iniquitously treated by 
the Sorbonne which I| mpute to the Injustice 
of the age and the impiety which prevails, 
and also to the too great power of the 
Loyolists who are their powerful enemies.” 
Writing to Belm (October 28, 1631) he says: 
“In our Christian religion I believe as we 
all should believe, many things that we do 
not see. . . but it is by means of the faith 


‘| 80 - 


which obliges us to; . . . but in medicine 
I believe only that which I see.” 

He admired the writings of Calvin. In a 
letter to Falconet (May 24, 1650) he says: 


There never was a man as learned as Calvin 
in ecclesiastical history. At the age of twenty- 
two he was the most learned man in Europe. 
I was once at a banquet at one of our gradua- 
tion exercises where one of our old doctors 
named Bazin said that Calvin had falsified all 
the Holy Scriptures. But I took up the good 
man whom I rendered so ridiculous, that M. 
Guénault, the younger, who was near me 
said that I pushed him too much and that I 
should have pity on his age and debility. Jean 
de Montluc, bishop of Valence, said that Calvin 
was the greatest theologian in the world. Have 
no fear that they say as much in Rome. 


On April 10, 1665 he writes to Falconet 
that “‘as a good parishioner” he had that 
morning attended mass at Saint-Germain 
PAuxerrois where he saw the King who was 
present in great state. 

Writing to Belin, fils, apropos of the 
Dutch and their wars he says: “But the . 
Pope and the Jesuits will never fail to arouse 
a war against those men, who will not 
believe in Purgatory, nor purchase from 
them indulgences, medals, blessed grains 


J 81 F 
and other spiritual bijoux.’’ He writes 
several times in 1660 that he is anxiously 
awaiting a book of Huguenot theses which 
is being published at Genoa. He also refers 
several times in the same year to a Latin 
translation of the Bible made in England 
with notes by Calvin, Beza, and other 
Huguenots. Yet he tells Belin (February 7, 
1648) that he belongs to the Parish of 
Saint-Germain-l’Auxerrois and he was in- 
terred in that church after his death. He 
refers sympathetically in several places to 
the Huguenots massacred in Savoy. 

He writes a confession of faith to Belin 


(July 18, 1642): 


I put no credence or belief in possessions, nor 
in sorcerers, nor miracles that I neither see nor 
discern. I believe all that is contained in the 
New Testament, as an article of faith, but I will 
not give like authority to all the legends of the 
monks, fabulosis et commentitiis narrationibus 
Loyolitarum, who in the romances which they 
send us from the Indies, say things as imperti- 
nent and as untrue as the fables of AEsop. You 
would say that these men worked only to in- 
fatuate the world. It is true that if we were all 
wise, these master pharisees of Christianity 
would be in danger of soon dying of hunger, 
Credo in Deum Christum crucifixum, etc. de 


‘| 82 > 


minimis non curat practor. Deception, horrible 
thing, is altogether unworthy of an honest man, 
but it Is even worse when it is mixed in and 
employed in religious affairs, Christus ipse, 
qui veritas est, non indiget mendacio. I cannot 
put up with the stinking falsehoods which the 
monks retail to the world to authorize their 
cabal, and it astonishes me greatly, imo serio 
trascor, that they have so much credit. 


A friend of Spon’s who met Patin at Paris 
thought he was an ecclesiastic. Patin writes 
to Spon (January 24, 1651): 


I pray you to salute M. Sarrazin on my part 
and tell him that I am much vexed that he 
should have taken me for a priest, seeing that 
I am not and never shall be one, and even that 
I had not wished to be in spite of the efforts of 
my mother, and that I have often praised God 
that he did not make me a woman, a priest, a 
Turk or a Jew. 


Tallemant des Reaux® relates that Patin, 
whom he terms a learned physician of the 
Faculty, pretended that one of his patients 
when dying had promised to return after 
his death and tell him if there really was a 
purgatory. Patin said that the dead man 
did appear to him one morning, but that 


‘Les historiettes de Tallemant des Reaux, II, 
193, Paris, 1840. 


‘| 83 | 
he did not speak, because those who return 
from the other world never talk. 

Patin was a great admirer of Jansen and 
of Arnauld. He speaks of their writings in 
terms of the highest esteem and condemns 
In unmitigated terms on many occasions 
the persecution which they suffered at the 
hands of the ecclesiastical authorities. 

From some of the many references to him 
in the Letters, it would appear that Patin 
knew Arnauld, or at any rate had seen him. 
He describes® him as follows: ““M. Arnauld 
is a little, dark, ugly man, born at Paris, 
the son of a learned advocate, who for- 
merly plead vigorously against the Jesuits 

. He is a doctor of the Sorbonne and 
very learned, aged forty-six years . . . and 
one of the most brilliant men of the day.” 

Patin frequently expresses great admira- 
tion for Jean Duvergier de Hauranne, Abbé 
of Saint-Cyran, who wrote a book in which 
he belabored the Jesuits. It was entitled 
“Petrus Aurelius”’ and was published anon- 
ymously in 1653. Amongst other hard 
things he said the Jesuits were “Omnium 
adulatores et omnium inimicr”’ (The flat- 
terers and enemies of everybody). This 
phrase Patin frequently quotes with cordial 

6 Letter to Charles Spon, February 26, 1656 


| 84 | 

approval. The book went through several 
editions and was warmly approved of by 
many of the clergy. Godeau, the Bishop of 
Grasse, especially, wrote in praise of the 
author. The Jesuits, however, finally suc- 
ceeded in having it suppressed. Saint- 
Cyran died of apoplexy in October, 1643, 
and Patin writes’ that he was loved and 
revered by all worthy men and above all 
at the Sorbonne. 

Patin was greatly delighted with the 
“Provincial Letters”? (Lettres Provinciales) 
of Pascal. They appeared m 1656 and 
created a great sensation. Their circulation 
was prohibited, but Guy writes Spon that 
he will send them to him and tells him what 
rage and consternation they have created 
among the Jesuits. Patin writes repeatedly 
of the massacres of the Protestants of 
Vaudois, speaking of them as “the poor 
Huguenots,” and stating several times his 
joy at hearing that Cromwell had interfered 
on their behalf. He proposed to demand 
the punishment of those who had instigated 
and conducted the massacres. 

He writes to Spon (January 19, 1656): 

The pest is yet very bad at Rome, but it 
spares the pope and the cardinals. Perhaps it is 

7 Letter to Charles Spon, October 26, 1643. 


| 85 | 
because it thinks they are more evil than it. 
Nevertheless thirty-six good and wise physicians 
are dead, and it is they whom I regret. The 
pope and the cardinals never lack. There are 
always enough of them. 


Also (November 18, 1659): “If the pest 
took only monks, generals of orders, and 
especially the general of the Jesuits, I think 
Christianity would hardly lose.” 

Patin’s narrative of the so-called “‘Mira- 
cle of Port Royal” is very amusing. A 
niece of Pascal’s suffered from a Iachrymal 
fistula and according to the Port Royalists, 
was cured by the application of a thorn 
which had been one of those in the Crown 
of Thorns. The miraculous cure was certified 
by four physicians, Bouvard, Hamon, and 
the two sons of Patin’s old enemy, Renaudot. 
Patin laughs at the whole affair in a letter 
to Spon (November 7, 1656) saying It was 
put forth as counterblast to the many 
miracles claimed by the Jesuits. He adds: 


Some have asked me my opinion. I answered 
it was perhaps a miracle that God had per- 
mitted to Port Royal to console those poor 
people that one calls Jansenists, who for three 
years have been persecuted by the pope, the 
Jesuits, the Sorbonne, and the greater part of 
the deputies of the clergy, also to lower the 


{ 86 } 


pride of the Jesuits, who are very insolent and 
impudent, because of some credit which they 
have at Court. 


Writing to de Salins, a physician at 
Beaume (March 27, 1655), he tells him to 
make a little hidden library containing 
among other lesser known books those of 
Rabelais, Marot, Montaigne and Erasmus: 


Your book by Marot® is not bad. Guard it 
well and hide it for fear the monks steal it from 
you and burn it. Put with it M. Francois 
Rabelais’, the Catholicon of Spain (one of the 
most popular satires against the League). The 
Republic of Bodin, the Politiques of Lipsius, 
the Essays of Montaigne, the Sagesse of Charron, 
the Doctrine curieuse of Pére Grasse, the 
Récherche des récherches, these are books 
which are capable of taking the world by the 
nose. I would except from them the two last 
which are good for other reasons. Do not 
neglect them and make of them a little library 
which will be a reductis et extra insidias 
monachorum. 

For the writings of Erasmus, keep them, 
propter authoris dignitatem. 


8 Clement-Marot wrote a metrical version of the 
Psalms in French about the middle of the sixteenth 
century. It was very popular with the Huguenots 
and equally hated by the Catholics. 


| 87 | 

O the excellent man that he was! Drink a 
little of the good wine of Beaune to his memory, 
cum novella uxore, and I will give you reason 
on the first occasion. Read his Colloquies once 
a year and place them im the library above men- 
tioned, cum ejusdem authoris lingua et encomio 
moriae atque institutione principis christinae. 


Patin professes a great admiration for 
the “Religio Medici” of Sir Thomas 
Browne. In a letter to Spon (October 21, 
1644) he writes: 


There has arrived here from Holland a little 
book, entirely new, entitled Religio Medici, 
written by an Englishman and translated into 
Latin by a Dutchman. The book is very pleasant 
and curious, but very delicate and mystical. 
You will receive it in the first package or by the 
first way that I may find. . . . The author 
does not lack spirit, you will see in it strange 
and ravishing thoughts. There is yet scarcely 
a book of this sort. If it be permitted to the 
wise to write thus freely one would learn much 
of novelty, there was never a Gazette worth it. 
The subtlety of the human mind can show 
itself in this way. 


Again in a letter to Spon on April 16, 
1645, he writes: 


They make a great deal of the book entitled 
“‘Religio Medici.”’ Its author has ésprit. There 


J 88 } 


are a good many things in the book. He is an 
agreeable melancholic in his thoughts, but he, 
in my judgment, searches a master in religion 
like many others, and perhaps in the end he will 
not find one. 


It is rather surprising to find Patin writing 
to Spon (July 26, 1650) in terms implying 
admiration of the eccentric spagyrite and 
Rosicrucian, Sir Kenelm Digby (1603- 
1665), the inventor of the famous “‘sympa- 
thetic powder,” because if ever there was a 
believer m occultism, rt was that doughty 
English knight. Be that as it may, Patin 
writes: 


M. le chevalier K. Digby, an English gentle- 
man, a very zealous catholic, learned and 
curious, has written while journeying, as he has 
done much for twenty years, chiefly in Italy, a 
Treatise on the Immortality of the Soul, in 
English printed today at Paris. It is this same 
Knight who has written also in English against 
the author of the book entitled Religio Medici. 
I ardently wish that that which he wrote of it 
was also put in Latin, seeing that I have a high 
opinion of these two minds (ésprits). 


Of another Englishman Patin writes to 
Belin, fils (October 28, 1659): ““Bacon was 
a chancellor of England who died in the 
year 1626, who was a great personage, of 


‘| 89 | 

an elevated and curious mind. All that 
which he has done (written) Is good.” 

When Thomas Hobbes, the English phi- 
losopher who wrote “Leviathan,” was ill 
in Paris in 1651, Patin attended him. He 
writes Falconet (September 22, 1651) that 
Hobbes suffered from an attack of vomiting, 
with a greatly distended abdomen, and 
much pain. Patin, of course, proposed to 
bleed him but Hobbes refused to allow him 
to do so, objecting on account of his age, 
which was sixty-four years. 


The next day, having insinuated myself a 
little more into his good grace, he permitted me 
to bleed him, which gave him a great relief. 
He alleged to excuse himself that he did not 
think one could take so much bad blood from 
him at his age. After that we were comrades 
and great friends. I allowed him to drink all the 
small beer that he wished. At last after a little 
purgation he was in good condition. He thanked 
me very much, and said that he would send me 
something good from England. May he soon 
return there gay and joyous, without any further 
hope of recompense. 


Patin hated bitterly the Jesuits and all 
other ecclesiastics who mingled in affairs 
of state. To the Jesuits he frequently 


‘1 90 | 

referred as “that Spanish and _ loyolitic 
vermine” or “‘the black troop of disciples 
of Pére Ignace,” and the “‘carabins de Pére 
Ignace.” “The world has been in perpetual 
trouble since the monks put their nose in 
its affairs. The philosophic liberty of phy- 
siclans prevents them from loving much this 
sort of men.’’® 

In several places he terms the Jesuits 
“the executioners of Christianity.’ Writing 
to Spon (November 16, 1643): “These 
executioners follow a la fin every occupa- 
tion imaginable, provided there is something 
to be gained by it.” 

Patin,’® writing of a book by Isaac de la 
Peyrére in which the author argued for the 
existence of a race of men on earth before 
Adam, the pre-Adamites, says there are 
others who claim that the inhabitants of 
Australia and America are not descendants 
of Adam but belong to a totally different 
creation. ““These are curious men, gazet- 
teers of another world, very like our 
preachers, who often let themselves go, 
tellmg us marvels of a country where they 
have never been and to which they will 
never go.” 


®Letter to Belin, May 20, 1632. 
10T etter to Spon, September 14, 1643. 


‘Lor F 

Patin in a letter to Falconet (June 17, 
1659) quoting the Greek philosopher who 
when dying consoled himself with the 
reflection that in the other world he would 
be with good men, philosophers, poets, and 
physicians, adds: “I am of the same mind. 
If I could meet Cicero, Virgil, Aristotle, 
Plato, Juvenal, Horace, Galen, Fernel, 
Simon, and Nicolas Pietre, R. Moreau and 
Riolan, I would not be in bad company. 
There will be that to console me. I believe 
that there are many good men in that coun- 
try In recompence for this, where they are 
very rare.” 


FRIENDSHIP WITH NAUDE 


One truly human friendship Patin had, 
with a most congenial soul, namely, Gabriel 
Naudé, the famous librarian of Cardinal 
Mazarin. Naudé was born at Paris in 
February, 1600. He and Patin were fellow 
medical students in 1622. He received the 
degree of Doctor of Medicine from the 
University of Padua in 1628, but does not 
seem to have ever practiced medicine, 
devoting himself entirely to books, first as 
Itbrarian to President de Mesmes, then as 
librarian and secretary to Cardinal de 


‘| 92 

Bagny, at whose death he served Cardinal 
Barberini in the same capacity at Rome, and 
afterwards Richelieu. In 1643 he assumed 
charge of the wonderful collection which 
Mazarin was gathering together. This 
amounted at the latter’s death to 45,000 
volumes, and owed its great value largely to 
the judgment and erudition of Naude. In 
1623 Naudé had published the book by 
which he is probably best known today, 
‘““Apologie pour les grands hommes soup- 
connez de magie,” which was translated 
into English by J. Davies m 1657, under 
the title, ““The History of Magic, by Way 
of Apology for All the Wise Men Who Have 
Been Unjustly Reputed Magicians, from the 
Creation to the Present Age.” In 1627, 
while still librarian for President de Mesmes 
he published his “Avis pour dresser une 
bibliothéque,” which went through a num- 
ber of editions and was translated into 
English by John Evelyn, and published in 
1661, with the title ‘‘ Instructions Concern- 
ing Erecting of a Library.” 

Many amusing stories were told of Naudé 
by his contemporaries. He bought books in 
quantity by weight and measure, instead 
of by title or volume. Walking into a book- 
shop he would scan a pile of books, not 





GABRIEL Naupf 
(1600-1653) 


THE LIBRARY 
OFTHE 
“UAIYERSITY. OF ILLINOIS 





193 


paying any attention to the individual 
volumes, and then offer the dealer so much 
per pound or foot for the lot. Taking them 
home he would sort them out, placng some 
in the Cardinal’s library, buying some for his 
own which was very large, and then selling 
the duplicates. He was im the seventh 
heaven of happiness in his position with 
Mazarin. Although the great Cardinal was 
avaricious to the last degree, he would spend 
his ill-gotten gains like water for additions to 
his Itbrary. He sent Naudé all over France, 
and to Italy, Germany and England in 
quest of them. He ts first mentioned by 
Patin in a letter to Belin, dated May 14, 
1630, stating that he is sending him a small 
book which is the ‘“Paranymph”’ for the 
year 1628,” written by a very learned young 
man named M. Naudé.” Its subject was 
after Patin’s heart: De antiquitate et dig- 
nitate scholae medicae Parisiensis panegyris; 
cum orationibus, encomiasticus ad 1x 1atro- 
gonistas laurea medica donandos. 

Naudeé figures frequently in Patin’s cor- 
respondence. On August 27, 1648, he writes 
to Falconet a most amusing little skit about 
a projected trip which he, Gassendi and 
Naudé have planned for the following 
Sunday. The three are to go out to supper 


‘1 94 F 


DE 
ANTIQVITATE 


ET DItGNIVT Ate 


SCHOLE MEDICA 
PARISIENSIS 


PANEGYRIS, 


CV M ORATIONIBVS 
ENCOMIASTICIS AD IX. 
Latrogonistas laurea Medica 
donandos. 


Auctore GaBR. NAVD&o, 
Parif. Phil. 


Dinitijs animofa fuis, 


ee 


LVTETIZ PARISIORVM, 
Apud Ioannem Moreav,via lacobe4; 
fub figno Globi Caleftis. 

M. DC, XXVIIL | 
CYM PRIVILEGIO REGIS, 


TiTLe Pace oF “DE ANTIQUITATE”’ BY GABRIEL NAUDE, 1628. 
Q 


195 F 
and to spend the night at Naudé’s house 
at Gentilly: 


There make a debauch, but God knows what 
debauch. M. Naudé drinks nothing but water, 
and has never liked wine. M. Gassendi is so 
delicate that he would not dare to drink it, 
and imagines that his body would burn up if he 
had drunk of it . . . for me, I can but throw 
sand on the writing of these two grand men; 
I drink very little, and nevertheless it will 
be a debauch, but philosophic and perhaps 
something more, for to be all three cured of 
night wolves (loupgarou) and delivered from 
the evil of scruples, which is the tyranny of 
consciences, we will go perhaps until very near 
the sanctuary. The past year I made this 
journey to Gentilly, alone with him téte-a-téte, 
there were no witnesses, also none were missed; 
we talked freely of everything, without anyone 
being scandalized by it. 


On November 16, 1652, Patin writes to 
Belin, fils, that Naudé has gone to Sweden, 
where he had accepted the position of 
librarian to the eccentric Queen Christina, 
but his stay there was short; as in May, 1653, 
Patin writes that all the French whom the 
Queen had gathered about her, had been 
discharged from her service except Naudé, 
whom she wished to remain, which he 


‘1 96 } 

refused to do, preferring to leave with his 
fellow-countrymen. Naudé lived a short 
time afterwards; his death occurred at 
Abbeville in July, 1653, as he was returning 
to France at the bidding of Cardimal 
Mazarin who had returned to power. 

The only criticism Patin writes of Naudé 
is contained in a letter to Spon (March 22, 
1648) mn which he says that Naudé had been 
to see him and had complained of the 
avarice of Mazarin in that he had paid 
him very little for the services that had 
been rendered him: 


I think it is the fear of dymg before having 
amassed wealth to leave to his brothers and 
nephews of whom there are a great many. And 
by this example I see easily that the passions 
enter just as much as ever in the minds of 
philosophers. I am however very sorry for it 
seeing that he 1s an honest man and worthy of 
better treatment by such a master (as the 


Cardinal). 


Naudé was a freethinker. In an undated 
letter to Falconet, written in 1662 or 1663, 
Patin expatiates at length on the opmions 
and character of his deceased friend. He 
thmks he had been inspired with indiffer- 
ence about religion during his residence of 
twelve years at Rome, also that his unbelief 


‘1 97 | 


had been fostered by one of his teachers, a 
professor of rhetoric at the college of 
Navarre. Of his personal character he 
speaks most highly. He was prudent, wise, 
well regulated, with “a certain natural 
equity”? and a good friend, “‘no swearer, 
mocker nor drunkard. He drank only water 
and I never heard him knowingly tell a 
falsehood. He hated hypocrites, those who 
had once deceived him, and Itars.’”’ In one 
of his books he asserted that Jeanne d’ Arc. 
had not been burned but that an effigy of 
wood had been consumed instead. Patin 
refers to a number of authors who have 
written that she really did suffer at the 
stake, and adds: 


For myself I am very strongly for this girl 
who has been an excellent heroine. I believe 
that all the miracle was political and beautiful 
finesse painted with the sacred and holy name of 
religion; which leads the world by the nose. . . 
I have, moreover, heard it said that she was 
not burned but returned into her country, 
where she married and had children. 


Of course such detractions arise concern- 
ing almost all the great figures of history, 
but the authenticity of Jeanne d’ Arc’s story 
has been established beyond question. Not 


| 98 | 

to speak of her recent canonization by the 
Roman Catholic Church, the records of 
whose heroes and heroines do not always 
bear too close scrutiny, the investigations 
of historians have unearthed legal evidence 
and contemporary statements which amply 
confirm the historic narration of her murder 
in the market place at Rouen. As to the 
miraculous fictions about her mission they 
merely detract from the grand simplicity 
of her story. 

Naudé was not a very gallant man. He 
said: “I could never bring myself to get 
married. The way is too thorny and difficult 
for a studious man.”’!! 

During the troubles of the Fronde, after 
the Court had left Paris the Parlement of 
Paris, after proscribing Mazarin, ordered 
that his library should be sold. Patin writes 
Falconet (January 30, and March 5, 1652) 
about the sale: 


All Paris goes there as to a procession. I have 
so little leisure that I cannot go, joined to which 
the librarian, who had charge of it, is M. Naudé 
my friend of thirty-five years,who is so dear to 
me that I cannot bear to see this dissolution and 
destructon. . . . Sixteen thousand volumes 
have already gone, there remain but twenty- 

11 Naudeana et Patiniana, Amsterdam, 1703. 


| 99 | 
four thousand. . . . M. Naudé, who is very 
angry against the Parlement, has bought all 
the books on medicine for 3,500 livres. 


The King finally intervened and stopped 
the sale by a letter to Fouquet, the procurer- 
general, in which he also ordered that the 
money obtained be refunded and the books 
restored, as much as possible. In his will 
Naudé bequeathed the books that he had 
bought from Mazarin’s library back to 
the Cardinal and the latter bought the 
rest of the books in Naudeé’s collection, so 
that they all became part of the great 
Mazarin Library in which they still remain. 
Queen Christina and many others who had 
purchased books at the sale, followed 
Naudé’s laudable example so that when, in 
1660, the Cardinal died leavmg an immense 
sum of money and his library to form the 
Collége de Quatre Nations, the greater 
part of the books that Naudé had collected 
for him were again brought together. 


CHAPTER V 


PATIN IN RELATION TO His STUDENTS AND 
His Sons 


The younger son of his friend Belm! came 
to Paris to study medicine and Patin wel- 
comed him to his house where, for a time, he 
came frequently. Then he remained away. 
Patin examined him at every visit. After a 
lengthy absence the examination was not 
satisfactory and Patin advised his father 
to take him back to Troyes. One can 
easily divine that the young man’s visits 
to Patin were not an unmixed pleasure, for 
Patin thought he was indulging in debauch- 
ery. Patin’s letters about him to his father 
are very kindly worded. In 1646 young 
Belin ran away from Paris and joined the 
army, owing Patm money and what was 
worse not having returned some books 
which Patin had Ient him. Sometime after- 
wards young Belin wrote to Patin telling 

1 This was not the Belin, fils, with whom Patin cor- 
responded. His letters were addressed to Claude 
Belin 11; the lad who studied at Paris was yet another 
Claude, according to Triaire, who was registered as a 
physician at Troyes in 1654. 

[ 100 | 


‘| 101 

him with whom he had Ieft his books, 
thereby reconciling himself to him, and 
later wrote again asking Patin to intercede 
with his father for him. 

Patin wrote to Belin, fils, on October 17, 
1642, an interesting letter of advice as to the 
reading the young physician should pursue: 


Read only Hippocrates, Galen, Aristotle, 
Fernel, Hollier, Duret, Sylvius, Riolan, Tagault, 
Joubert, and very little of others, in quibus 
Hofmannus ipse dux regit examen. I am having 
printed here another book by him, of which I 
will make you a present in about a month as 
the author himself has sent it to me. Read the 
good theses of our school. Look at those which 
you have of them, to the end that I may send 
you the best if you have them not. While you 
have a little leisure, read all that Thomas 
Frastus has written and especially “De occultis 
pharmacorum estatibus,” and his four volumes 
“‘Adversus novam medicinam Paracelsi.’’ Read 
also every day the “Aphorisms,” the “ Prog- 
nostics,” the ‘ Prorrhetics,”’ the “Epidemics or 
the Coaques”’ of Hippocrates. On the “ Aphor- 
isms,’ take of all but three commentators; to 
wit, Heurnius, Hollier, and Galen. 


Again he tells young Belin, October 24, 
1646: 

Read every day some good book, and learn by 
heart, if you do not know them already all the 


“| 102 | 


“Aphorisms” of Hippocrates . . . Do not let 
any day pass without studying at least eight 
hours. Read carefully the “Pathology” of Fernel 
and the first four books of his ““General Method”; 
add to it the practice of J. Hollier, with the 
‘“*Enarrations”’ of M. Duret, and the“‘ Aphorisms”’ 
of Galen, of Hollier, and of Heurnius. The best 
surgeries? are those of J. Tagault and of 
Gourmelin. 

There are three treatises by Galen which you 
should choose and frequently read something in 
them, to wit: “‘De locis affectis; de morborum 
et symptomatorum causis et differentiis,” and 
his books on the “Method.” You will do well 
to add that which he wrote by way of commen- 
taries on the “Epidemics” of Hippocrates. If 
you desire another pharmacy than the “Meth- 
od”’ of Fernel, read Renodaeus but do not let 
yourself be carried away in the current of 
so many promises as do the antidotaries who are 
destitute of experience. Nevertheless it is nec- 
essary to know something of compositions for 


2It will be noticed that throughout his corre- 
spondence Patin never recommends the surgery of 
Paré, except when he himself added anonymously a 
treatise on fevers to a posthumous edition of Paré’s 
works, but even then he does not refer to any 
excellence on the part of Paré’s own books. 
Gourmelin was the bitter enemy of Paré and it was 
in reply to his attacks that Paré wrote his “Apology 
and Journeys in Divers Places,” 1575. 


{103 | 

fear that the apothecaries artis nostrae scan- 
dala et approbria, can take the bar over 
you . . . Do not lose your time reading many 
of the moderns who only make books of our art 
from lack of practice, and from having too much 
leisure. Above all flee books on chemistry, in 
quorum lectione oleum et perdes. 


It should be noted that, in a certain sense, 
Patin was not a reactionary. He was an 
upholder of the Old Greek medicine, that of 
Hippocrates and Galen, against the pseudo- 
Greek medicine of the so-called Arabian 
school. For many centuries the Arabians 
had captured the preemimence in medical 
teaching and belief. The works of Avicenna, 
Avenzoar, Rhazes, and their fellows were 
the guides on which the medical profession 
of Europe founded their faith until well mto 
the sixteenth century, and the Arabic 
traditions died hard, lingering imto the 
seventeenth century. The new school com- 
prised those who had taken up the new rem- 
edies imtroduced by Basil Valentine, 
Paracelsus, Van Helmont, de Mayerne, and 
many others. As these chemists compounded 
many formulae and believed implicitly in 
the efficacy of their various preparations 
against diseases, Patin could not see any 
good in their teachings. He only saw in 


[| 104 F 
them a new set of therapeutists who, like the 
Arabs, disregarded the teachings of the 
Greeks, as to the supreme importance of 
observation and diagnosis, and the mx 
medicatrix natura, in their desire to invent 
new remedies, and panacea. Other wiser but 
less prejudiced physicians than Patin, felt 
as he did that the salvation of medical 
practice lay in a return to the Greek tradI- 
tion. Two men especially did much to 
promote this end. René Chartier, to whom 
Guy manifested such bitter enmity, pub- 
lished the works of Hippocrates and Galen 
in Greek and Latin with annotations, and 
Foestus published his magnificent Hippoc- 
rates in Latin, thus placing the works of the 
great master within reach of the many 
physicians who knew Latin but not Greek. 
There was a great division in Patin’s time 
between the tatromathematical school, rep- 
resented by Borelli and Sanctortus, and the 
iatrochemical school whose foremost rep- 
resentatives were Van Helmont, Franciscus 
de Ie Boé, or Sylvius, and Willis of England. 
The former held that all bodily actions and 
functions could be explained by the laws 
of physics. The tatrochemists held they 
were due to chemical activities mn the organs 
and tissues. Patin’s inclinations were evI- 


| 105 

dently with the  iatromathematicians, 
though he shows but little interest in the 
many great advances in anatomy which 
were made during his lifetime. He mentions 
the writings of men like Steno, Sanctorius, 
de Ile Boé, but chiefly praises or dispraises 
them for their typography or binding. He 
lauds highly those authors who adhere to 
the Hippocratic tradition and condemns 
virulently those who show any tendency to 
use the much detested “‘chemical”’ remedies, 
such as antimony. I have referred elsewhere 
to his views about Van Helmont. Harvey’s 
book, the greatest contribution to medical 
science of his age, or for that matter any 
other age, the “De motu cordis”’ published 
in 1628, is only referred to m connection 
with the publication of books attacking his 
demonstration of the circulation of the 
blood by Patin’s friend, Riolan, or by Prime- 
rose of Bordeaux. 

Another young medical student for whom 
Patin acted as mentor at Paris was Noél 
Falconet, the son of Patin’s correspondent, 
André Falconet. Their family contamed 
many distinguished physicians. Charles Fal- 
conet was physician to Marguerite de 
Valois, the first wife of Henri 1v. His son 
André, Guy’s correspondent, was born in 


‘| 106 | 


1612, and died in 1691. He practiced medi- 
cine at Lyons. When his son Noél came to 
Paris to pursue his studies Patin mani- 
fested the same fatherly mterest in him that 
he had shown in young Belm. Young 
Falconet came to Paris m 1658. When 
Falconet wrote to Patin that he intended to 
send him there the latter replied (September 
24, 1658), advising him to keep him at 
home rather than send him to Paris: 


Here the youth are marvelously debauched. 
You would make him a physician? He could 
study his philosophy at Lyons and later you could 
send him here for one or two years to study 
medicine. If your son remains near you, you will 
be more his master, his health will fortify itself, 
and he will be more capable of believing me in a 
year, if I am yet here. When he shall have 
studied here sometime, it will be necessary to 
make him pass doctor (get his degree) in a short 
time, and afterwards retire him near you, when 
he will follow you to your patients, and learn 
more in three months than in four years at Mont- 
pellier, where I hear that the young men are 
very debauched. I have many examples of it but 
take little interest in them. Being at Lyons near 
you, he can render you a good account of his 
leisure and at his ease and to his great profit 
he will read Hippocrates, Galen, Fernel, and 
Duret . . . If you retain your son at Lyons to 


{ 107 

study his philosophy, try to make him study 
Greek as well so that he will know his grammar, 
the New Testament, Lucian, Galen, and Aris- 
totle. In two years he will be more robust and 
better able to stand his first winter at Paris, 
which is extraordinarily severe for newcomers 
and to the young, and even then he should be 
sent here in the month of August so that he may 
pass the autumn here and become accustomed 
(acclimated) before the winter comes. 


Falconet did not take this sage advice but 
sent his son to Paris in the autumn of 1658. 
Falconet asked Patin to take him to live 
with him as a house-pupil. Patin writes 


(October 29, 1658): 


I have never wished to take anyone en pen- 
sion, although I have been asked to many times, 
but I can refuse you nothing. You talk to me of 
the price of board and lodging. I do not know 
what it is, I demand nothing of you. Tell me 
only if you wish him to study philosophy and 
what wine you wish that he should drink. For 
the rest he shall be nourished in our ordinary 
fashion, which will suffice a student. 


Patin writing to Falconet (January 3, 
1659) gives a pleasant picture of his home 
life and of the hospitality with which he 
treated his son. He tells him how the 


‘| 108 | 


boy has enjoyed seeing the beautiful 
churches of Paris, and of some theological 
questions which they had discussed to- 
gether, and how Noél goes frequently to see 
his son, Charles, at his house in the rue 
Saint-Antoine, “where he always sees some- 
thing beautiful.” Charles, being a numis- 
matist, had many beautiful pictures and 
medals. 


Often after supper warming ourselves about 
the fire, I talk to him of the great events of our 
history, of the deaths of the three kings, Henri 
u, Henri 111, and Henri rv, of the deaths of the 
two Guises at Blois in 1588, of the Maréchal de 
Biron, of the Marquis d’Ancre, which I make 
him read near me in our historians. He says that 
Jacques Clément and Ravaillac, who killed 
Henri 11 and Henri tv (who I tell him were very 
good kings) were wicked rascals . . . Hehasa 
great wish to go there (to Cormeilles) at Easter 
with my wife, and see all our trees in blos- 
som. We have there five hundred little pear trees 
without counting the prunes, peaches, apricots, 
mulberries, and fig trees, and will return from 
there to Saint-Jean where he will see two hun- © 
dred cherry trees charged with ripe cherries. For 
three years I have had a great wish to take you 
there, but you have (when here) too much busi- 
ness; he will view them in your place. Our house 
Is near the mountain on which we have a wind- 


‘L 109 | 
mill from the top of which onesees the great spire 
of our church at Beauvais. We will show him 
that and teach him the topography of all the 
environs and suburbs of Paris. 


When Chereau sought Patin’s country 
house at Cormeilles he found only the 
cellars remaining, a new mansion having 
been built. There still existed vestiges of the 
windmill, and many cherry trees flourished 
on the grounds. 

Guy’s second and favorite son, Charles, 
“‘mon Carolus,” was evidently a great 
friend of the young student. Patin writes 
Falconet somewhat later in the same month 
that Charles has promised to take Noél on 
the anxiously desired country trip at Easter. 

In August, 1659, Guy tells of taking 
him walking and showing him the Latin 
motto on the great clock of the Palais de 
Justice, advising him to copy It as a good 
sentiment. Then they went to Cormeilles 
together, and on their return Patin took him 
to see the execution “of a thief who was 
broken on the wheel. They gave us a cham- 
ber from the window of which he saw all the 
ceremony of this mystery of destroying men 
for their crimes.”’ This was done to inculcate 
a moral lesson, as Patin adds: “It was not 


| 110 & 
without expatiating to him on the unhappt- 
ness of the wicked who resolve to steal and 
kill to have money for debauchery and 
gambling.’’ Robert Patin was attending the 
wife of one of Mazarin’s household who was 
ill at Vincennes, and he took his mother 
and young Noél Falconet in the carrosse 
with him when he went there one day in 
order to show them the chateau. Patin 
(October 6, 1659) telling the father about 
this little excursion, adds, “he promises 
marvels, God give him grace to do well.” 
Patin (April 6, 1660) writes Falconet: 


Since you do not wish your son to go to Lyons 
for his vacation I am well content. He will eat 
of our good cherries and mulberries at Cor- 
meilles, afterwards he will return here to learn 
the “Compendium” of Riolan, the father, and 
the “Enchiridium” of Riolan, the son. After 
that the winter will come, our public acts 
(demonstrations) and frequent dissertations will 
occupy him; you know these are the fundamen- 
tals of our profession. Finally he will study the 
pathology and general method of Fernel, with 
the “Aphorisms” of Hippocrates and the 
“Commentaries” of Hollier. I will make him 
write on paper the good things and practices. I 
will also take him to see patients where he will 
learn the modus agendi. All this can be done in 
thirteen_or fourteen months and afterwards he 


‘| III - 
can return to Lyons to see you and report to you 
on his studies. 


Possibly young Falconet was aware of 
Patin’s weakness and flattered him some- 
what because Guy writes to his father (July 
2, 1660): 


Noél Falconet acquires every day some degree 
of wisdom, and will answer well. He greatly 
loves to be near me and hear me talk. Day 
before yesterday after dinner, as we were talking 
together, there came an honest man, with whom 
I talked about a half-hour, and then took him 
into my office to give him a prescription. This 
man, an officer of the king’s, looked at him much 
and when we were alone he said, “that young 
man there listens to you attentively and wishes 
to learn. Ah! but if I was in his place I would 
profit by your presence.” 


Patin adopted the usual method of 
Instruction, making his pupil learn from 
books and notes. He writes (August 10, 
1660) that he Is going to make Noél “learn 
by heart the first chapters of the ‘Com- 
pendium’ of M. Riolan, the father, and 
afterwards his commentaries on the physi- 
ology of Fernel, with the ‘Enchiriditum’ of 
the son. It is the way I taught my two sons, 
and it succeeded there very well.” 


‘| 112 


Apparently young Falconet only stayed 
temporarily at Patin’s house because Guy 
writes his father (September 21, 1660): 


Noél Falconet studies and often asks me good 
questions. I [ent him some books to study but he 
wished to have his own, so I took him to the rue 
Saint-Jacques* and bought for him im his pres- 
ence the works of Riolan, the father, in two vol- 
umes in octavo, and the “Enchiridium ana- 
tomicum et pathologicum”’ of the son. I have 
also promised him a “ Perdulcis,”’ and have lent 
him a Fernel in folio which he likes. He wishes 


3 The rue Saint-Jacques was the great bookshop 
center of Paris at that time. Patin’s correspondence, 
as would be expected, is full of reterences to this 
famous thoroughfare. He writes to Belin on August 
17, 1652 of a book which Belin had demanded, 
“TI will have it tomorrow if ic is to be found in the 
rue Saint-Jacques,”’ and he writes jokingly to Charles 
Spon on November 16, 1645, that if the Pope ever 
comes to Paris he will go to see his entry and “await 
him in the rue Saint-Jacques in a booksellers, read- 
ing some book.” In this connection we also find 
Patin applying the term Latm to that part of 
Paris lying on the left bank of the Seine which is 
still known as the Latin quarter. In a Ietter to Spon 
(May 24, 1650) he says: “I went yesterday au 
pays Latin, where the University Is, to a consulta- 
tion to which I had been called by one of my col- 
leagues for the son of a councilor of Rouen. I went 
by way of the rue’ Saint-Jacques. All our book- 
sellers are marvelously dry and ruined.” 


| 113 | 
also the “Anthropographia”’ of M. Riolan, and 
Hollier in “Aphorismos Hippocrates, quia con- 
ciliavit doctrinam veterum cum nostra metho- 
do Parisieni,” which is better than that of the 
Italians. 


PATINS DOMESTIC CIRCLE 


On October 10, 1628, Patin married 
Jeanne de Jeanson, the daughter of a rich 
wine merchant of Paris, whose mother was 
a daughter of the celebrated Miron, the 
provost of the merchants of Paris. Ten 
children were born of the union, four of 
whom attained adult age, namely, Robert, 
the physician; Charles, the physician and 
antiquary; Pierre, of' whom we only know 
that he became a Master of Arts in 1649, 
and that he signed the certificate of decease of 
his father in 1672, and Francois, who became 
a soldier and was killed in a duel by one of 
his comrades at Plessis-Bouchard, October 
9g, 1658. He was buried in the church at 
Cormeilles the next day. Chereau* was 
shown by the curé at Cormeilles-en-Parisis 
an old parochial register containmng the 
following entry: 


Ce mesme jour, 10 Octobre, 1658, Francois 
agé d’environ dix-neuf ans, fils d’honorable 


4 Union Médicale, 1864, 2d series, xxill, 401, 449. 


1 114 F 
homme Mr. Guy Patin, docteur régent en la 
Faculté de médecine de Paris, a esté inhumé en 
Ia chapelle, Nostre Dame: Iequel Francois 
Patin a esté tué le jour précédent, par un sien 
camarade de guerre, entre Francomille et le 


Plessis-Bouchard. 


As there is no reference to the career or 
the loss of this son in Patin’s letters, it may 
be presumed that there was an estrangement 
between the father and son. 

To judge by the frequent references to 
his children in the Letters, Patin was a 
devoted father. He writes to Charles Spon 
(March 24, 1648): “‘I love children. I have 
six of them and it seems to me that I have 
not yet enough. I would be very glad to 
have another Iittle girl. We have but one, 
who Is so sweet and so agreeable that we 
love her nearly as much as our five boys.” 

Guy writes to Spon (May 25, 1648) with 
curious candor about his wife’s relatives: 


For eight whole days I have been detained 
near my mother-in-law, who has been very ill 
with a pleurisy of which she, Dieu merci, was 
quit, by means of four bleedings which she has 
borne very well, in as much as she is nearly 
eighty years old. The good man is scarcely less, 
and they are on the eve of leaving me for my 


| 115 | 


part an inheritance of 20,000 crowns, et vir 
sapiens non abborrebit. 


Patin’s father-mn-law showed no inclina- 
tion to hasten the fulfilment of his hopes. 
Two years later (February 4, 1650) Patin 
writes Spon: 


My father-in-law has again obtained some 
respite from the park (cemetery). In this last 
attack he was bled eight times from the arms, 
and each time I made them take nine ounces 
from him, although he ts eighty years old. He is 
a fat and full-blooded man. He had an inflam- 
mation of the Iungs with delirium, and, in addi- 
tion, stone in the kidneys and bladder. After the 
bleeding I had him well purged four times with 
senna and syrup of pale roses, by which he has 
been so marvelously relieved that it is miracu- 
lous, and he seems rejuvenated. Many people 
would not have believed it and would believe 
rather some fable of a julep cordial. He shows 
me much contentment but although he is very 
rich he gives no more than a statue. Old age and 
avarice are always in good intelligence with one 
another. Such men resemble pigs which leave 
all in dying, but are only good for anything after 
they are dead because they are good for nothing 
during their life. It is necessary to have patience, 
I will not neglect to take good care of him. God 
has given me the means to do without the wealth 


| 116 & 


of others, and live content till now without ever 
thinking evil. 


‘| 
aL. 


Patin’s mother-in-law died on July 8, 
1650, and he wrote to Spon on July 26, 
1650, and again on August 8, 16450, describ- 
ing her Jast illness, an apoplexy, and render- 
ing her a somewhat piquant last tribute. 
She was eighty-two years old. Patin was at 
Paris but hastened to her country place at 
Cormeilles where she was taken ill. 


I found the good woman in extremity . . . 
She had been bled and cupped in awaiting my 
coming by the surgeon of the place, in such sort 
that there remained nothing for me to pre- 
scribe . . . Finally she died in the evening and 
was buried in the church there the next day 
with much ceremony, very useless and super- 
fluous . . . Webrought back the good man her 
husband the next day, who is more de- 
crepit than she was although several years 
younger . . . There is hope that after his 
death we will have a great inheritance . . 
She was an excellent woman in the care of her 
household and in the pains which she took 


with it . . . I can not give myself the pain of 
weeping much for her seeing she was too old and 
too often ill . . . Do not weep much for the 


death of my mother-in-law, she was not worth 
it. She was a good woman, very rich and avari- 
cious, who feared nothing so much as death 


| 117 f 

which nevertheless seized her quite suddenly 
at the end, at her beautiful country house at 
Cormeilles. She has gone before where we will go 
after. Let us try at least to go there with 
tranquillity and (better) reputation, and that 
our children may be thankful to us as good 
fathers, in meriting from them veritable grati- 
tude. 


Patin only refers to his wife in a very 
casual way throughout the correspondence. 
He speaks once of her pride in their good 
fortune as we have seen, but she seems not 
to have entered much mto his thoughts or 
affairs. He hints at her rather disparagingly 
in a letter to Spon (October 5, 1657). The 
Iatter’s wife had visited Patin at Paris and 
the latter writes: 


Mon Dieu, but she is a worthy woman. Ah! 
but you are fortunate to have one.so good, so 
perfect, and of such good humor. Mine has many 
very good qualities, but she is sometimes cross 
and cruel to valets and maids, which are 
characteristics I hold for nought, but she has 
them Jure gentilitio. Her deceased mother who 
lived eighty-four years was of the same humor. 
You have been more fortunate than others. Is it 
that God mixes in your affairs? 


In a letter to Falconet (June 3, 1661) 
Patin makes the followmg ungallant_ re- 


118 


marks: “The late M. de Villeroi, grand 
secretary of state, who had a bad wife 
(he was not alone im that and the race is not 
extinct) said that in Latin woman was 
mulier, that is to say mule bier, mule 
demain, mule toujours.” 


ROBERT PATIN 


As already stated, the Patins had four 
children who attained adult age. Robert, 
born in 1629, 1s frequently mentioned in the 
course of his father’s correspondence. Some 
of Guy’s letters are written in his hand, he 
evidently having acted as his father’s sec- 
retary. Patin wrote to Spon in May, 1648, 
telling him of his joy that Robert had 
received his degree of Bachelor of Medicine 
at the age of nineteen, the youngest of his 
class. They quarreled on occasions and there 
was a serious breach between them at the 
end of Guy’s life. In a letter to Spon m 
1649, Guy wrote that Robert could do very 
well 1f he wished, but that he did not like 
to study and was volatile and flighty. He 
married Catherme Barré in 1660. Writing to 
Belin, fils, June 2, 1660, he says that two 
days before, he had married his eldest son 
to a beautiful girl, who comes of honest 
people, to whom he had been the physician 


{| 119 F 
for twenty-five years. “She ts beautiful, she 
is rich.” 
Patin gave up his chair of Professeur du rot 
to Robert in 1667. He wrote to Falconet 
(August 12, 1667): 


Yesterday my eldest son, Robert Patin, took 
possession of the charge of professeur royal, for 
which I had obtained for him the succession. 
It has come with a good augury, because he 
celebrated by his harangue his natal day, having 
been born the eleventh day of August, 1629. I 
pray God that he may enjoy it a long time. I 
have raised my children with great care and 
great expense. I hope they will reap agreeable 
fruits from it. 


Robert died of phthisis on June 1, 1670. 
Chereau’ gives the following entry from the 
register of the church at Cormeilles: 


Le deuxieme jour de juin mil six cent soixante 
et dix a este inhumé dans l’église a Ia chapelle de 
la Vierge, Mr. Robert Patin, docteur en la Faculté 
de médecine de Paris, demeurant a la paroisse 
de Saint-Germain-de [’Auxerrois 4 Paris; en 
presence de Mr. Guy Patin, aussi docteur et 
professeur du roi, son pére, et de Pierre Patin, 
son frére qui sont signé. 


Although Charles was undoubtedly his 
favorite son, and Robert seems at times to 
5 Union Médicale, 1864, 2d series, xxill, 401, 449. 


4] 120 > 


have caused his father some vexation, never- 
theless Patin was sincerely grieved when 
Robert died at the age of forty-one, but a 
few years after succeeding to Guy’s pro- 
fessorial chair at the Collége Royal. In May, 
1670, he refers on several occasions in his 
correspondence to Robert’s illness, which 
seems to have made a rapid progress 
towards its end. He sent him, accompanied 
by his wife and his mother-in-law, out to his 
country place at Cormeilles mn the hope that 
the change of air would help him. The 
bereaved father wrote Falconet (June 4, 
1670): 


At length, Monsieur, I am desolate, O me 
miserum! my eldest son died, the first of June. 
God wished to have his soul! he died a good 
Christian with great regret for his faults, et cum 
maxima in Christum fiducia. I pray God with a 
good heart that he will preserve you and those 
who belong to you. It is not necessary to go so 
soon, one dies soon enough . . . He died at 
Cormeilles, where he had been taken to have an 
air more pure than that at Paris. He was buried 
near his maternal grandmother and his brother 
Francois in the chapel of Notre Dame, near to 
the choir. Requiescat in pace. I am so broken 
down with sorrow at his death, and so fatigued 
by the journeys which his illness caused me to 


‘| 121 


make, that I am capable of nothing. I pray you 
to witness my sorrow to M. Spon to whom I 
have not written of this misfortune because I am 
so much afflicted, and from whom I do not even 
ask consolation. It is necessary that I weep all 
my life for a son so learned . . . He leaves 
three boys and a little girl, of whom the eldest is 
nine.years, and from whom I hope for some con- 
solation, because he has much ésprit, learns well, 
and is very gentle. We will do that which pleases 
God, who holds in his hand the good and bad 


fortune of men. 


In 1669, Robert according to Sue had 
gotten his father’s signature to a document 
which enabled his wife to interfere m the 
disposition (affaires) of Patin’s estate after 
his death, so that it was necessary to sell 
Guy’s library of upwards of 10,000 volumes 
after his death, in order to satisfy her 
claims. The old man wrote to Falconet in 
July, 1671, a few months before his death, 
“that the diversity of the studies of his son 
Charles consoled him in some sort for his 
absence, but that the maliciousness of 
Robert confounds him.” “This mgrate has 
deceived me wickedly, even while dying. 
I would never have thought that of an older 
son in whom I had trusted entirely.” 


‘| 122 


CHARLES PATIN 


Charles Patin was born on February 23, 
1633, studied Iaw and became an advocate 
at Paris mn 1648, but in 1654 gave up his 
legal career and took up that of medicine. 
Patin tells Belin that at the age of fourteen 
years he has been examined publicly in 
Latin and Greek philosophy, before a large 
audience and got his degree of Master of 
Arts. “I am going to put him back ‘at his 
humanities for another year and then make 
him study law, so that some day he can 
defend me if the apothecaries undertake to 
attack me again.” Writing to Garnier, a 
physician of Lyons, November 2, 16409, 
Patin says: ““My Charles is studying law, 
but I would like it better if he would employ 
his time at medicine for which I find him 
much better suited. I talk to him of it often 
and he knows more of it than his elder 
brother; finally, I would prefer that he 
should be a physician rather than a law- 
maker, I would teach him many fine 
observations.” In a letter to Spon in 1649, 
Guy says he is better poised and loves to. 
study more than his brother Robert, and 
that he is very learned in “‘Greek philos- 


®Letter, August 18, 1647. 


yl eet Ma 
ophy, geography and law.” His portrait 
depicts a bright intelligent countenance of 
much physical charm. Writing to Spon 
(December 10, 1658) Patin tells him: 


It is very cold but we have wood to heat us, 
added to which it is warm in my study, and we 
study all the evening téte-d-téte until the hour 
for supper, and after that we talk around the fire 
of some agreeable matter, physics, history, or 
politics. Our Carolus always relates to us some- 
thing curious. He loves ancient times and talks 
gaily of them to us, so much so that we often go 
to bed an hour Jater than we had resolved to. 


He was apparently on the high road to 
success. He seems to have been a popular 
lecturer on anatomy, for Patin (December 
16, 1659) writes to Falconet: 


My son, Charles, is teaching anatomy in our 
school on the cadaver of awoman. There isso great 
a number of auditors that besides the theater the 
court yard was filled. He begins well at twenty-six 
years, I hope he will finish better. He has many 
friends who love him. Through his studies he 
has acquired many and through his courtesy 
yet more. 


On November 24, 1667, Guy wrote to 
Falconet describing with what éclat Charles 
had participated in a discussion on the 


| 124 F 

relative merits of Homer and Virgil, and 
that Lamoignon, the President of the Parle- 
ment of Paris and one of the chief men in the 
city, had shown him marked favor, yet a 
few months later, in February, 1668, Charles 
had fled from France and was sentenced to 
the galleys in contumacy. Patin writes of it 
to Falconet (March 7, 1668) as follows: 


I write lastly to you about the affair of my son 
in which I[ had expected that the knowledge of 
the truth and the succor of my good friends 
would have remedied it, but hope, according to 
the sentiment of Seneca, is the dream of a man 
who ages. Nevertheless, since it is a virtue, I 
would not abandon it whatever should arise, for 
it Is permitted even to the most wretched to 
dream and to deceive themselves. Everybody 
pities him, no one accuses him, and with the 
exception of some publishers he is loved by 
everybody. Meanwhile he is absent and we are 
obliged to resign ourselves in spite of his 
stoicism. He had always hoped that the justice 
of the King would be extended to him but our 
enemies had too much credit. Meanwhile, to 
soothe our wound, they say, (1) that his process 
had been made in contumacy, as a man absent, 
who could not defend himself; (2) that it was by 
royal and special commission and without right 
of appeal which is extraordinary and shows more 
than ever the design they had to condemn him; 


| 125 | 


(3) that most of his judges had received lettres de 
cachet and the recommendation that it was nec- 
essary to make an example. But to what could 
this example serve? Is it that while the Hol- 
landers and others print books of history, and 
chiefly of our country, of which the authors live 
in Paris, one can take from individuals the desire 
-and curiosity to read them? (4) They allege it 
was a man of great standing who was our secret 
adversary who moved the wheels and intrigued 
against us, because they found among his books 
some volumes in defense of M. Fouquet, and of 
the enterprise of Gigeri.? Why do they not 
punish the authors of these books? Why do they 
not prevent their publication in Holland, or 
their importation into France? All these books, 
and others like them, have been sold at Paris by 
the booksellers at the Palais and in the rue 
Saint Jacques. It excites the desire to see these 
books that one would suppress and hide with so 
much rigor . . . They have named three 
books, to wit, one full of impiety, a Huguenot 
book entitled, “L’Anatomie de la Messe,’”’ by 
Pierre Dumoulin, minister of Charenton; as if 
the Inquisition was in France! It was sold for six 
sous. Paris is full of such books, and there is 
scarcely a library where one cannot find them, 


7 Patin evidently hints at Colbert in these remarks. 
It is well known with what animosity Colbert pur- 
sued all those who sought to uphold the cause of his 
predecessor. 


| 126 


even with the monks. There ts liberty of con- 
science in France and the booksellers sell them 
every day. It is even permitted to a man to 
change his religion and become a Huguenot, if he 
wishes; and it will not be allowed a studious man 
to have a book of this sort; also he had only a 
single copy. The second was a book, which they 
said was contrary to the service of the King. It 
was the “Bouclier d’état,” which is sold pub- 
licly at the Palais, and to which they are print- 
ing here two answers. The third is “L’histoire 
galante de Ia cour,’ which consists of little 
libels more worthy of contempt than anger. I 
think these three books are only a pretext, and 
that there is some secret enemy who is angry at 

my son, and the cause of our misfortune. I hope 
that God, time, and philosophy will deliver us 
and put us at rest, and in waiting, Lord God, 
give us patience. It Is necessary in this world to 
be either the anvil or the hammer. I have never 
had great care, but here it is all of a sudden, 
when I am sixty-seven years old. It is necessary 
to bear patiently that for which there is no 
remedy. Finally God wills it thus. 


Patin apparently did not think that Col- 
bert was responsible for the persecution of 
his son, for when Colbert was ill a few years 
later, Patin writes Falconet (June 2, 1671): 


For me I have a particular interest in his 
recovery, besides that he has often spoken well 





CHARLES PATIN 


(1633-1693) 


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| 127 | 

of me, and that he has raised my salary as royal 
professor, it is that I expect from it the liberty of 
my son, Carolus, for although many persons have 
believed that it was he who had him persecuted, 
he has said several times, even of his own will 
(méme de son propre mouvement), that it was not 
he. Thus we are reduced to knowing neither 
the accusation nor the accuser. But, as I have 
told you, I have good hope that this great minis- 
ter will contribute to our happiness, in spite of 
the solicitations of our enemies. 

On August 14, 1668, confirming a decree 
of the Chatelet previously issued March 25, 
1668, Charles had been summoned before a 
special commission for trial without right 
of appeal. The only charge formulated 
against him was that certain prohibited 
books had been found in his possession: 
*‘L’anatomie de la messe’”; the ““Memoire”’ 
published by Fouquet im his defense; and 
Bussy-Rabutin’s “Histoire galante de la 
cour,’ books which as his father says, 
were sold publicly by the booksellers of 
Paris. Guy Patin writes: “I thmk these 
three books are only a pretext and that there 
is some hidden party who Is angry with my 
son and who is the cause of his misfortune.” 
Bayle,* after quoting Guy Patin’s explana- 
tions of his son’s disgrace, says that they do 

8 Dictionnaire historique et critique. 


‘| 128 > 


not touch on the cause which was rumored 
about Paris as the true reason for his exile. 
It was said that Charles had been sent to 
Holland to buy up all the copies of a 
scandalous book, “Les amours du palais 
royal,” and burn them at once, not sparing 
a single copy. He was given this commission 
by a “Grand Prince,’”’ who promised to 
recompense him. Charles was said to have 
purchased the books but mstead of destroy- 
ing them he was accused of bringing them 
into France where they would, of course, be 
in great demand. Pic conjectures, without 
giving any very valid reasons, that he may 
have become mvolved in a love affair with 
some lady upon whom the King had 
bestowed his affections. He bases his sup- 
position on the facts that Colbert, the 
all powerful minister, had taken an active, 
though secret part in his conviction, the 
majority of the judges having received 
lettres de cachet, ordering them to find him 
guilty; that Charles Patin never attempted 
even while living m security in foreign parts, 
to justify himself, and that in 1681 he was 
offered a full pardon by Louis x1v. Charles 
refused the proffered amnesty, saying “of 
what pardon would they speak to me? I did 
not know my crime.” 


‘| 129 | 

Pic recalls that Colbert had interested 
himself mn the King’s love affairs before, and 
that the trial of Charles Patin coincided 
in date with the advent to power over the 
King’s affections of Madame de Montespan 
(1669), and that the pardon had been 
offered to him, without solicitation at the 
epoch of her displacement by Madame de 
Maintenon (1681). He thus accounts for the 
personal interest taken by Colbert and his 
royal master in the affair. 

There does not seem much to support the 
idea that the exile of Charles Patin may 
have been due to a love affair. His wife 
followed him in his exile and apparently 
they lived with one another until parted by 
death, in perfect accord. There is another 
explanation for his persecution which seems 
more probable. In 1665, Denis de Sallo 
founded the Journal des Savants. Patin 
writes to Falconet (March 20, 1665): 


I do not know if you have received a certain 
kind of gazette, which they call the Journal des 
Savants, in which an author who complained 
against a little article of my son, Charles, on the 
deal which was made here last year for the Swiss, 
is answered by him. I have sent you his answer, 
which is wise and modest. The new Gazette 
replied ignorantly and extravagantly, to which 


‘| 130 F 

there had not lacked a strong and sharp response 
with good reasons, if they had not prayed 
Charles to suspend his reply, and menaced him 
with a lettre de cachet. The truth is that M. Col- 
bert takes under his protection the authors of 
this journal, which is attributed to M. de 
Sallo, counselor in Parlement, to M., the Abbe 
de Bourze, to M. de Comberville, to M. Chape- 
lain, etc., insomuch that Carolus is advised to 
delay his response, and even, by the advice of 
the premier president, who has also requested it 
(they say for a particular reason, to wit, that he 
does not stand well with M. Colbert since the 
process of M. Fouquet) . . . The republic of let- 
ters Is for us, but M. Colbert is against, and if my 
son defends himself, they say they will send him 
to the Bastille. It would be better not to write. 

This was not the only time that Charles 
Patin had been in trouble with the police 
for having im his possession contraband 
books. Pic’s friend, M. Paul Delalain, dis- 
covered in the Bibliothéque Nationale the 
dossier of Charles Patin containing his 
sentence in 1668. Attached to it was the 
report of the arrest of both Charles and his 
father for an attempt to smuggle contraband 
books into Paris. They were bringing them 
into the city from Bourges, when their 
carriage was stopped and the two doctors 
apprehended and taken to the douane. 


yee tl 

Among the books were ninety-two copies of 
Rabelais, the “Lettres provinciales,” the 
Journal des Savants, ‘‘L’ histoire des amours 
d Henri tv,” “Rome pleurante,”’ ‘Le 
Roman comique de Scarron,” and _ fifty 
copies of “‘L’ histoire amoureuse des Gaules.”’ 
The latter Guy Patin attempted to dispose 
of by throwing them down a Iatrine, but he 
was caught by the customs officers, and the 
books recovered by scavengers. There is no 
record of any punishment meted out for this 
offence beyond confiscation of the books. 

In 1666, Guy and Charles Patin were 
arrested for having m their possession 
contraband books. 

Again in 1667, the elder Patin was in 
trouble for the same cause. Fifty copies of 
the works of Hoffmann (Hoffmann’s “‘Opera 
omnia’”’) were found in his possession, and 
confiscated. ‘“They were destined, not for 
presents, as he claims, but to be sold, accord- 
ing to his custom.” After escaping from 
France, Charles Patin traveled and lived in 
England, Germany, Holland, Switzerland 
and Italy. He held several professional 
chairs at Padua, among them those of sur- 
gery and practice. 

Patin was cheered by letters from Charles, 
showing that he had been well recetved in his 


|] 132 


wanderings, and was not greatly depressed 
by his banishment. Thus Patin writes to 
Falconet (September 13, 1668): 


I have had good letters from Germany. By 
them I learn that my dear son, Charles, diverts 
himself there i traveling, and visiting worthy 
men. He has lately been at Frankfort, where our 
good friend, M. Scheffer, recetved him very well, 
also M. Lotichius, M. Horstius, and other men of 
letters. He writes me that he studies, and that 
he does not afflict himself too much at quitting 
his country. Securus sine crimine vivit. The 
Elector Palatine wished him well, and invited 
him to dinner twice a week, and asked him to all 
the amusements of the Court. He has even 
offered to write to the King on his behalf, but 
Charles is a Stoic, who says he does not wish to 
owe his return to anyone but the King. He says 
he is a wise Prince. They have persecuted him in 
his name, but that he will cause him to return 
when he wishes. If that does not happen, I will 
say with Cayas and others, O ingrata patria, non 
babebis ossa mea! I have more wish to see him 
than he has to return. My God, when shall it be? 


Patin writes Falconet (April 26, 1669): 


My Carolus has left Heidelberg and has gone 
to see the Duke of Wurtemberg, who has de- 
manded his medical aid. He has already made 
another journey there, with which he was well 


{ 133 } 

content, as the Prince was also with him, send- 
ing him away with handsome presents, and 
charging him to return soon to see him. He 
writes me that if he loved money he would have 
the occasion to be satisfied, and that besides his 
profession in which they honor him much (you 
know that which is the honorarium of physicians 
and lawyers), these princes love greatly to play 
at. tric-trac with him and they willingly lose. 
He says they are the honestest players and best 
men in the world. 


Charles published a little book of travels? 
which contains nothing indicativeofany great 
erudition on the part of the author, reading 
more like the jottings of an idle dilettante 
than a work written by a Iearned antiquary. 

In 1682, Charles Patin published a 
volume of “The Lives and Pictures of the 
Professors at the University of Padua,’’?° 
mcluding his own life and portrait as pro- 
fessor of surgery among them. This* auto- 
biographic sketch, however, is disappoint- 
ing in that it throws no light on the reason 
for his exile. He relates with complacency 

® Relations historique et curieuses de voyages en 
Allemagne, Angleterre, Hollande, Bohéme, Suisse, 
par Charles Patin, Docteur en Médecin de Ia Faculté 
de Paris. Amsterdam, 1695. 


10]. yceum Patavinum. Sive icones et vitae pro- 
fessori. Patavil, MDCLXxx1I. Publice Docentium. 


‘] 134 | 


LY CE Via 
PAT A V-I NEYeSe 


Siue 
ICONES ET VITA 
PROFESSORVM, 
PATAVIIs MDCLXXXII. PVBLICE DOCENTIYVM.: 


PARS PRIOR, 
Theologos , Philofophos & Medicos complecens. 
PER | 
CAROLVM PATINVM:;> EQ. D. M. 
DOCTOREM MEDICYM PARISIENSEM, 
Primarium Chirurgie Profeflorem, 





















































PATAVII, MDCLXXXIL 


eae 


Typis Petri Marie Frambotti, Superiorum permiffu . 








TitLe Pace oF ‘‘ LycEuM PATAVINUM” By CHARLES PATIN, 
1682 


| 135 F 

the many honors he has received since leav- 
ing his native and, and expresses the happi- 
ness which filled his life at the time he 
wrote. He refers with affectionate respect 
to his father. 

Patin writes Falconet (June 19, 1663) of 
Charles Patin’s marriage, speaking as 
though he were doubtful of its success: 


I have married my son, Carolus, aged thirty 
years, to the daughter of my colleague, M. P. 
Mommets. Her name is Madelon, and she is 
nineteen years less four months old. A beautiful 
girl, well born and well brought up by a good 
father and a wise mother, Utinam omnia fauste 
succedant. It is a bargain of which I am doubtful 
as to the success; uxort atque viro est fatalis. 


His wife and daughters were very learned 
and all published books on various subjects. 
Charles died at Padua on October 2, 1692. 


CHAPTER VI 


OPINIONS OF PATIN 
THE PHARMACOPEIA OF PARIS 


In a letter to Belm (January 18, 1633) 
Guy writes of the ‘“Dispensatory”” which 
the Parlement of Paris had ordered to be 
compiled by the Faculty in 1590. There was 
no official pharmacopeta or dispensatory 
(Guy elsewhere refers to it as an antido- 
taire, guidon des apothicaires, etc.) in 
France. The first one in Europe was that of 
Valerius Cordus published by order of the 
senate of Nuremberg in 1544, entitled “ Dis- 
pensatorium pharmacorum omnium quae 
In usa potissimum sunt.”? Patin says the 
French apothecaries used as textbooks the 
“‘Antidotaire” of Nicholas Praepositus of 
Salerno, first printed m 1471; and the 
“Dispensatorium Galenochemicum” of 
Renou (Renodaeus, 1608). The order says 
It was to be made by twelve members of the 
Faculty. The original members having died, 
those who replaced them allowed the work 

1 Triaire: Lettres de Guy Patin, 1630-1672, Paris, 
1907. 

[ 136 ] 


L378 

to lapse, saying that such a publication 
would only serve to maintain the rascality 
of the Arabs to the profit of the apothe- 
caries, and Guy” quotes the Pietres i sup- 
port of this view adding that three grains 
of senna in a glass of water purge as well or 
more surely than a heap of arabesque com- 
positions. He says the apothecaries do not 
like him for his practice but that the people 
are so tired of their barbaresque tyranny 
and bezoardesque cheating that It Is easy to 
escape from their, the apothecaries’, hands. 
According to Guy there is no better phar- 
macopeia than ‘“ “Le médecin charitable’ 
reinseignant la maniére de faire et préparer 
a la maison, avec facilité et peu de frais les 
remeédes propres a4 toutes les maladies selon 
Padvis du médecin ordinaire,” written by 
Philibert or Philippe Guybert, which was 
immensely popular. Guy wrote a “‘traité de 
Ia conservation de la santé” which was 
added to the book in its seventeenth 
edition. 

The Pharmacopeia of Paris was finally 
published in 1628, and entitled “Codex medi- 
camentarius seu phar-nacopoeia Parisienst.”’ 

Years afterwards (July 20, 1656) we find 
him again writing Belin, that there Is no 

*Letter to Belin, 1643. 


Guybert perces cferite malgré les enuteux 
Conferue la Jante des Jeunes, ct des Vicux. 





FRONTISPIECE OF PHILIBERT GUYBERT’S “LE MEDECIN CHaRI- 
TABLE.” Paris: J. Jost. 1633. 


| 139 F 
better way to defeat the apothecaries than 
to introduce into families “‘Le médecin 
charitable” along with a syringe, bouil- 
lons and ptisans, made with senna and 
other emollient herbs. 


PATIN AND THE BOOK TRADE 


From the above it may be seen that Guy 
Patin though holding his head so high as a 
docteur-régent, was also a dealer in books to a 
very considerable extent. These commercial 
doings crop out with great frequency in his 
lectures. Whether he dealt m books to 
mcerease his income ts doubtful. It would 
appear more probable that he was so intense 
a bibliophile that he could not refrain from 
handling them, whether in his library or in 
buying or sellmg. He seems to have enjoyed 
peculiar facilities for importing them and his 
activity in bringing foreign books imto 
France was beneficent. He writes to Spon 
(September 17, 1649) about the efforts 
made by a syndicate of publishers to close 
the bookshops on the Pont Neuf. There | 
were more than fifty of them, the privilege 
of opening them being sold by footmen of 
the King. Patin says they bought books 
stolen by children and servants and were 
a great annoyance to the regular trade. 


‘| 140 | 





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4 141 & 

In 1661, Patin besought the good offices 
of Falconet to secure the release of some 
books consigned to him, which had been 
seized by the customs officers at Lyons. 
A former student of Patin practiced medi- 
cme in Frankfort and when the great fairs 
were held in that city he used to buy books 
which he thought would mterest his old 
teacher and send them to him. Patin was 
greatly concerned when he was informed 
that the package had been seized at the 
douane, on the complaint of the syndicate 
of the booksellers of Lyons. He writes that 
the only reason he can tmmagine for such 
action was that some of the books might 
be Huguenot, but he justifies the importa- 
tion of such writings by the statements that 
Huguenot books are publicly brought into 
Paris and sold openly without any action 
against such trading on the part of the 
authorities. 

When the elder Moreau died he left a 
very valuable collection of manuscripts and 
printed books to his son. The latter con- 
sulted Patin as to the best method of dis- 
posing of them. Four booksellers finally 
purchased the collection and arranged to 
dispose of them at public sale but Patin 
writes Charles Spon (February 16, 1657) 


{ 142 F 

that Fouquet, the celebrated procurer- 
general, stepped in and purchased all the 
medical books. Just why Fouquet should 
desire a medical library is not known. 

Patin in a letter to Charles Spon (May 8, 
1657) sounds a note about the publishers 
of Paris which resembles very much the 
complamts of the real lovers of good Iitera- 
ture of the present time: “As to our pub- 
lishers of Paris I can hope of nothing from 
them. They print nothing at their own 
expense but novela utrisque sexus (sex 
novels), I mean love stories or miserable 
books of the new piety, visions of the 
dreams of monks, of miracles and revela- 
tions, of cards of Saint Francis or girdles of 
Saint Margaret.” 

One of the chief publishers went into 
bankruptcy mn February, 1658, and Patin 
writes to Charles Spon about it: 


M. Cramoisy, who is king among the pub- 
lishers of the rue Saint Jacques, has failed for 
more than three hundred thousand livres. 
This news surprises and marvelously astonishes 
me so much that I do not know who to trust 
any more among these dealers. I do not know 
how it could have happened, but I suspect 
that this man, who has printed so many books 
at the suggestion of the Jesuits, has warehouses 





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143 | 


full of miserable merchandise that he cannot 
sell. This is a great misfortune for the book- 
trade, nevertheless I do not think that the 
carabins of Pére Ignace will trouble themselves 
much about it, because these men, whatever 
money they may have care only for themselves, 
and practice craftily the old proverb, primo 
mibi, secundo Michaud. All the publishers of 
the rue Saint Jacques are greatly depressed 
but this stroke will mortify them yet more and 
diminish the little credit which they have. 


‘There were two brothers Cramoisy. The 
younger fled but the elder who Patin says 
was a very honest man remained at Paris 
protected by powerful political and eccle- 
siastical influence. 

Undoubtedly one of the “‘best sellers” of 
the time in France was the “Grand Cyrus” 
of Scudéry. Patin mentions in a letter to 
Charles Spon in January, 1654: 


Sieur Scudéry who is an illustrious writer 
has finished his ““Grand Cyrus, or Artaméne,’’? 
which is a very well received romance. He has 
written the “History of Alaric, King of the 
Goths,” which they commence to print in a 

3 This was a mistake of Patin’s as ‘“‘Artaméne ou 
Ie grand Cyrus” was written by Madeleme de 
Scudéry and “Alaric’” by George de Scudeéry. 
Patin had no use for the Scudérys, so was not 
particular as to detail. 


1 144 f 
folio, which will have many tazlles-douces. Books 
such as these sell very well here to the courtiers, 
to the partisans and their wives, as well as the 
books of devotion, especially when it is some 
Jesuit or other monk of reputation who has 
written them. 


On several occasions Patin refers with 
commendation to the books of Primerose, a 
physician of Scotch extraction, who prac- 
ticed at Bordeaux. His two chief books were 
““Exercitationes et animadversiones in librum 
de motu cordis et circulatione sanguinis, 
adversus Guilielmum Harveum”’ (1630), 
and “De vulgi m medicina erroribus.” 
Primerose was one of the most virulent and 
obstinate opponents of Harvey. 

Gaspard, or Caspar Hoffmann of Nurem- 
burg, another bitter opponent of Harvey’s 
demonstration, was greatly admired by 
Patin, who published an edition of some of 
his works. Patin refers to him very fre- 
quently m terms of extravagant praise. 
When Harvey was traveling in Germany as 
physician to the Duke of Arundel he visited 
Hoffmann at Nuremburg for the purpose of 
demonstrating to him the correctness of his 
views. Vesling, whom Patin also mentions 
with much admiration was yet another 
opponent of Harvey, basing his objections 


| 145 | 
on the different color of the blood in the 
arteries from that in the veins. 

It Is curious to witness such an obsession 
on the part of a man whose intellect was 
as keen as that of Patin. As a professor of 
anatomy, we know that he performed dis- 
sections, or at least lectured on bodies which 
had been dissected by his prosector for him. 
He was not however an original worker, 
probably contenting himself with reading 
anatomy to his students either from Galen 
or some contemporary whom he admired, 
such as Riolan, and not troubling himself 
to follow up on the body any of the wonder- 
ful anatomical discoveries of men like 
Harvey, Pecquet or Bartholin, to ascertain 
whether they were true or not. 


PATIN S HEALTH 


Guy possessed good health. The physi- 
cians of his time made their professional 
visits on a mule or on horseback. Patin 
apparently did the latter; at least he writes 
to Spon (January 8, 1650) “‘that he had 
been out every day on horseback,” and 
there is no mention im his correspondence of 
his ever having suffered any very serious 
illness during the seventy-two years of his 
life. The only indispositions he mentions are 


‘| 146 | 

the following: Writing to Spon (March 10, 
1648) he tells him that he has been ill with a 
bad cold that fmally required him to take to 
his bed and undergo seven bloodlettings; 
in another letter (March 7, 1651) he tells 
him that some years before, after drmking 
polluted water, he had passed blood and pus 
in his urme but that it had soon cleared up. 

He writes Belin (May 10, 1643) telling 
him that he had always been a very moder- 
ate drinker and ascribes to this the fact that 
he does not yet need glasses, “notwith- 
standing my age and my vigils.” 

Patin was consistent in applying his 
therapeutic views to himself when he fell 


ill. He tells Falconet (June, 1661): 


I had a bad toothache yesterday, which 
obliged me to have myself bled from the same 
side (as the pain). The pain stopped all at once, 
as by a kind of enchantment, and I slept all 
night. This morning the pain began a little 
again. I had the other arm bled and was cured 
right away. I am, thank God, without pain. I 
think that these two bleedings will serve to 
enable me to purge myself surely, which I shall 
do next week, if I have the leisure for it. 


Although he followed the ancient Greek 
and Latin medical authorities with blind 
faith, it is interesting to note Patin’s 


| 147 | 
freedom from belief in some of the tradi- 
tional remedies of his day. 

Thus he writes to Belin, fils (October 18, 
1631), at a time when a pestilential disease 
prevailed in Paris, that he does not believe 
that theriaca, mithridates, alkermes, hya- 
cinth, bezoar, or the unicorn’s horn are of 
any use, because he does not think they 
possess any of the occult properties attrib- 
uted to them.? 


4'Theriaca, or treacle as his English contem- 
poraries termed it, was regarded as a universal 
panacea against the bite of any venomous animal. 
It contained some sixty odd ingredients, among them 
bitumen, turpentine, saffron and vipers. It was 
invented by Andromachus, one of Nero’s physicians, 
and was in great vogue even as late as the eighteenth 
century. Evelyn in 1646 records in his “Diary”’ that 
when in Venice he went to see Its preparation, “‘the 
making an extraordinary ceremony whereof I had 
been curious to observe, for it is extremely pompous 
and worth seeing.’”’ In both France and Italy its 
manufacture was a long process attended with much 
ceremonial and many curious observances. The 
London Pharmacopeia for 1746 still retained it as 
official, as it also did mithridatum, a_ universal 
antidote supposed to have been invented by Mith- 
ridates, King of Pontus, and made of nearly as many 
ingredients as theriaca. Alkermes or kermes was, as 
its name would indicate, a product of Arabic phar- 
macy. It was made originally from cocoons which 
were found on a species of oak tree. It was especially 


{148 | 
Patin writes to Spon (February 4, 1640): 


The reputation of theriaca is without effect 
and without foundation, it comes only from the 
apothecaries who do all they can to persuade 
people to use compositions and would take 
from them if they could the knowledge and use 
of simple remedies which are more useful. If I 
were bitten by a venomous animal I would 
not trust in theriaca, nor in any cardiac, external 
or internal, of the shops. I would scarify the 
wound deeply, and apply to it powerful attrac- 
tives, and only have myself bled for the pain, 
fever, or plethora. But by good fortune there are 
scarcely any venomous animals in France. In 
recompense we have Italian favorites, partisans, 
many charlatans, and much antimony. 


famous in the form of the confection of alkermes. 
Hyacinth was not made of the plant of similar name, 
but from precious stones, especially amethysts. The 
confection of hyacinth contained many other ingre- 
dients, such as other stones, musk, myrrh, cam- 
phor and various herbs. Bezoar stones were concre- 
tions found in the gastrointestinal tracts of various 
animals, especially goats, Ilamas, and antelopes. Its 
use came from the Arabs and it was supposed to be a 
universal antidote for all poisons. Unicorn’s horn was 
generally made from the tusks of elephants or nar- 
whals, although supposed to be derived from the 
fabulous unicorn. Paré had fully exposed the useless- 
ness of bezoar and unicorn’s horn, though Patin 
never refers to his memorable treatise. 


[149 | 
THE PLAGUE AND SYPHILIS 


The pest of which Patin writes in the 
letter above quoted was the bubonic plague, 
as he says of It: 


There have been here since Easter a great 
quantity of malignant fevers, which have been 
as many hidden plagues, but one only names it 
the pest when one has seen buboes or charbons 
supervene, yet these diseases are not less con- 
tagious than the plague. 


He complains that although there are two 
hospitals, Saint Louts and Saint Marceau, 
in Paris, to which the plague-stricken were 
sent, there is no physician attached to 
either hospital to Iook after the patients. 
Patin says that he had seen more than sixty 
cases of plague himself, and that there was 
not a physician of the Faculté who could 
say that since the month of July he had not 
‘seen, found or discovered nearly every day 
someone who was not a victim of it, because 
it has been very common here.” 

He tells Belin (October 2, 1631) of the 
heroic action of a physician named Mal- 
medy who im the plague visitation in 1482 
and 1583 voluntarily shut himself in the 
plague hospital without pay. Patin adds 
somewhat spitefully, that nevertheless he 


ghoetod 
made a great deal of money im the hospital 
and lived to enjoy his gains for twenty years 
after, when he died of “pure old age.” 

Patin in a letter to Spon (January 8, 1650) 
makes a statement which goes far towards 
confirming the views of those who hold that 
syphilis was not imported into Europe from 
America, but that it existed in the Old 
World, but was regarded as a form of lep- 
rosy. During the medieval period and down 
to the beginning of the sixteenth century, 
leprosy was so prevalent throughout Europe 
that most communities of any size had leper 
hospitals to provide for its victims. At the 
present time leprosy is practically extinct 
in Europe, but syphilis ts universally preva- 
Ient. Patin writes: “The late Simon Pietre, 
older brother of Nicolas Pietre, two incom- 
parable men, said that before Charles vir 
in France, the syphilitics were confounded 
with the lepers, of which today our hospitals 
are for the most part empty.” 

Patin refers again to this confusion in the 
diagnosis between syphilis and leprosy in 
writing to Spon (May 11, 1645): 

It is not long since I was shown a patient, an 
Auvergnat, who was suspected of leprosy, per- 
haps because his family had the reputation to 
have had it among them, because there was no 


| 151 F 

mark on his person. This made me think of some 
lepers here. In other times there was a hospital 
here dedicated to receive them in the Faubourg 
Saint-Denis, which is today occupied by the 
priests of the mission of Father Vincent (Saint 
Vincent de Paul). One sees them neither in 
Normandy, Picardy, nor Champagne, although 
in all these provinces there are leper hospitals 
which have been converted into pest hospitals, 
Propterraritatem elepbanticorum. In other times 
they took syphilitics for lepers, qui per inscitiam 
medicorum et saecult barbariem, nec distin- 
guebantum ab elephanticis, nec sanobantur. 
Nevertheless there are still lepers in Provence, 
Languedoc, and Poitou. Francois Valleriola and 
Guilbert Ader assert it. Are there any in the 
Lyonnais? Have you seen any or recognized any 
as such? Have you in your city of Lyons a hos- 
pital for them? Have you seen them at Mont- 
pellier, or im any other places in Languedoc 
when you have been there? 


Patin presents to Falconet (September 
22, 1653) the historical and Iiterary evi- 
dences of the antiquity of syphilis: 


Bolduc, a Capuchin and Pineda, a Spanish 
Jesuit, have written that Job had syphilis. I 
am willing to believe that David and Solomon 
had it likewise. . . . In Hippocrates . . . and 
in Galen you can read about buboes, venereal 
ulcers, and gonorrhea. Morbus campanus, in 


5 ee 
Horace, is syphilis. It is found in Catullus, 
Juvenal and Apulius, and they even say in 
Herodotus and Xenophon. M. Gassendi said 
to me that the leprosy of the Bible was syphilis. 
A libertine said that the serpent in Genesis 
was a young devil who gave Eve syphilis, and 
that was the original sin of the monks, so said 
M. de Malherbe.® At least it is certain that 
syphilis was well known in Europe before 
Charles vir went to the conquest of the king- 
dom of Naples. . . . The late MM. Pietre, 


Riolan and Moreau were of the same opinion. 


The introduction of the preparations of 
opium into practice undoubtedly led to con- 
siderable abuse of it at the hands of the 
Incautious or unscrupulous. Its beneficent 
properties caused it to be hailed by many 
as the long sought panacea. The followers of 
Paracelsus were especially active in prescrib- 
ing It often m harmfully large doses. It 
should be stated that the preparation which 
Paracelsus himself termed laudanum and 
recommended so highly, was not the tinc- 
ture of optum to which we give that name 
today. The “Jaudanum”’ of Paracelsus was 
a gum or balsam called “lJadanon,” which 
was given in pill form. Patin, along with 
many of his contemporaries and those who 


5 Malherbe was the famous French grammarian 
and poet. 


[ 153 F 

came later, confused the terms and thought 
the Paracelsan remedy was an_ opiate. 
Patin, with his usual combmation of con- 
servatism and prejudice, condemned Iauda- 
num and all other preparations of opium 
with the utmost vehemence. Thus Michel 
Potier, in his works published in 1645, 
having commended opium and some of the 
“chemical remedies,’ Patin attacks him bit- 
terly in a letter to Spon (January 20, 1645): 


I have heard said by M. Moreau, who was an 
Angevin like this Potier, that he was a great 
charlatan and a great rascal, who mixed in our 
profession, only showing himself on the stage to 
sell his wares better. He left the kingdom and 
made his way to Italy. Likewise he made himself 
in his book the Aristarch and censor of physi- 
cians. To hear him talk, it was he only that had 
knowledge and understanding. That which 
makes me suspect all he does is that he talks too 
often of his diaphoretic gold, of his opium or 
laudanum, and condemns too much the other 
remedies from which the people every day 
derive solace. His book is a continual censure 
of ordinary medical practice. Nevertheless there 
will always be fools who will admire him, and 
honest men will not gain any profit from him. 
This book will become ridiculous, or else it will 
render ridiculous all the profession of which we 
are part, you and I. 


| 154 F 
OPPOSITION TO CINCHONA 


Patin does not condemn quinine, which 
had been introduced into France under the 
name of Jesuits’ bark, as bitterly as he does 
antimony and opium, but, being a novelty, 
he cannot approve it. He writes to Spon 
(January 30, 1654) that he had dined with 
Gassendi and had met at his table a M. 
Montmor, maitre des requétes. This gentle- 
man was a great collector of books and 
Patin was greatly delighted with him, 
especially when he intimated that he 
intended to employ him as his physician, 
but he adds that he has his doubts as to 
their according well together: 


M. Montmor has always loved chemistry and 
Is not yet undeceived as regards antimony, and 
his wife also leans to these heresies; she is also 
for the Jesuits’ powder, of which I have never 
seen any good effect in Paris. 


On March to, 1654, he writes Spon that 
the wife of de Gorris, one of his colleagues, 
had been found dead in her bed. She was 
sixty years old: “‘ All winter she had suffered 
from a triple quartan fever, to cure which 
she had taken cinchona by which she 
thought she was cured. I thmk that this 


| 155 F 
loyolitic powder (poudre loyolitique) short- 
ened her days.” 

Imagine Patin thnking well of anything 
emanating from the Jesuits; could aught 
good come out of Nazareth? Patin writes to 
Falconet (December 30, 1653): 


This powder of cinchona has not any credit 
here. Fools run after it because it is sold at a 
very high price, but having proved ineffective 
it is mocked at now. I had treated a girl for a 
quartan fever so successfully that the access of 
fever was reduced to two hours only. Her 
mother, impatient, having heard the rumor 
made by this Jesuits’ powder, purchased one 
dose for forty francs in which she had great hope 
because of the high price. The first access after 
this dose lasted seventeen hours, and was much 
more violent than any which she had had before. 
Today the mother has great fear of the fever of 
her daughter and much regret for her money. 


The enlargement of the spleen, so fre- 
quently associated with malarial fevers, was 
recognized by Patin and his contemporaries, 
but the following extract from a letter to 
Falconet (September 21, 1661) will serve to 
ilustrate the errors into which they fell 
because of the humoristic doctrine which 
dominated their views: 


| 156 | 

But apropos of quinquina, it performs no 
miracle here. When the body is well cleaned out 
by bleedings and purgatives, it is able by its 
(own) heat to absolve or absorb the remainder 
of the morbific matter, at least for that purpose 
it is only necessary to heat it. Even those in 
whom the fever has ceased are not entirely 
well, because it returns unless they are well 
purged. The obstinacy and duration of these 
quartan fevers comes from the bad, almost car- 
cinomatous condition of the spleen, which 
occupies Its very substance. I have never given 
cinchona. I have seen those who have trusted 
to It too much hydropic. I would not purge at 
the access of a quartan fever, but I purge often 
at the end of an access, with much success. Even 
in great fever, I sometimes make them swallow 
four great glasses of laxative ptisan, containing 
senna. That makes the bowels open well, carries 
off a portion of the conjoined cause, and pre- 
vents the annoyance of the great sweats, of 
which they complain so often. As to bleeding at 
the commencement of the access, I never do it. 
It would be both mprudent and temerarious to 
do so. 


ORVIETAN 


Orvietan was a quack remedy much in 
vogue in Patin’s time. 

Patin writes Falconet (January 6, 1654) 
of a curious episode in the Faculte de 


{157 F 


Médecine in regard to it. He begins with a 
denunciation of de Gorris, a physician with 
a very large practice in Paris: 


All his life he has been of the evil party of the 
chemists, the charlatans, the Gazetteer, the 
foreigners, the men with secrets against gout, 
epilepsy and quartan fever; a very unfortunate 
practitioner who has killed many with the 
experiments he would make. He knew truly 
much Greek and Latin, but applied his knowl- 
edge badly, and never had the courage to 
resist the temptation of gold for any rascality 
or corruption of his profession. In 1647, a mer- 
chant of Orvieto, to sell his drug better, ad- 
dressed himself to a man of honor, then Dean 
of our Faculté, M. Perreau, to obtain through 
him by means of a good sum of money which he 
offered him, the approbation of the Faculté for 
his opiate. He refused it with much dignity. The 
charlatan then addressed himself to de Gorris, 
who received from him a considerable present 
and promised him to get some doctors to sign 
an approbation of his medicament which he sold 
on the Pont Neuf, which he caused to be done 
by a dozen of others who were hungry for 
money. [hese were the two Chartiers, Guénault, 
Ie Soubs, Rainssant, Beaurains, Piart, du 
Clédat, des Fougerais, Renaudot, and Mauvi- 
lain. The Italian impostor, not content with such 
signatures, sought to have the approbation of 


‘| 158 | 

the entire Faculté, and pressed the new Dean, 
who was M. Pietre, my predecessor, to make 
him give it to him, in the hope which he had to 
make a better sale of his drug if he should 
obtain that which he desired. The new Dean 
learned from the charlatan’s own mouth all that 
de Gorris had done for him, and when he had 
assembled the whole Faculté, and recited the 
affair against these twelve Messieurs, hav- 
ing acknowledged their weakness and _ bad 
action, they were expelled from the Faculté by a 
solemn decree. However they were reestablished 
on certain conditions, notably that of demand- 
ing pardon from the company in full assembly. 
No matter what they have been able to do since, 
the stain remains on them. 


PATIN S VIEWS ON INFANT FEEDING 


Patin was a great believer in the nourish- 
ment of children by the maternal milk 
instead of on pap, which, as compounded in 
France at that time, was a mixture of wheat 
and flour, called bouillie. He thought that 
hand-fed babies were more subject to 
smallpox even im [ater life, and attributed 
his own exemption from that disease to the 
fact that he had been a breast-fed baby. 
He also thought that whooping- cough, 
which seems to have been as prevalent in 
France in his time as it is In our own, was 


| 1590 

predisposed to or aggravated by the arti- 
ficial feeding of children. He describes 
whooping-cough in one of his own children, 
a little boy of three months, who had been 
taken out in very cold weather by his nurse. 
The illness lasted five weeks with paroxysms 
of cough lasting from a half-hour to three- 
quarters, during which time Guy thought 
him in danger of suffocation. ““Iwo blood- 
lettings, enemata, good breast milk, absti- 
nence from pap, and keeping warm are the 
great remedies.” 

Patin’s particular objection to the use of 
pap was that It was “a coarse food which 
causes much stickiness and obstination in the 
stomach and abdomen, and which pre- 
disposes to illness of a putrid nature.” He 


adds: 


‘I hold pap a bad food, as much because of the 
flour which is not often sufficiently good, as 
because of the milk of the cow, which is far 
from the goodness of that of the breasts, which 
is taken entirely fresh and new, hot and spir- 
ituous by the child, whereas that of the cow is 
extremely weak in comparison, joined to which | 
It Is a gross, viscous food which makes a sticki- 
ness in the stomach of the child, and much 
obstination in its belly.® 


6 Letter to Spon, January, 1644. 


‘| 160 & 


He also says that smallpox was unknown 
to the ancient Greeks, and that children 
got no pap in their time. 

In Patin’s time human milk was much 
esteemed not only as a diet for children but 
also under certain circumstances for adults. 
Patin (April 1, 1650) writes to Spon that 
d’Esmery,’ the Superintendent of the Fi- 
nances Is very ill, and that Valot his physt- 
cian has put him on a purely milk diet. 
“In the morning he drinks ass’s milk, at 
midday cow’s milk, m the evening goat’s 
milk, and in between the milk of a woman.” 
The Duke of Alva, one of the greatest and 
cruelest generals of his time, in his old age 
had two wet nurses by whom he was 
nourished, and Dr. John Caius, the famous 
English physician who founded Gonville 
and Carus College at Oxford, was, when 
senile, fed in the same manner. Shakespeare 
hints at this m the “Merry Wives of 
Windsor,” when the Dr. Caius of the play 
has as his nurse, Dame Quickly. 

Patin advocated the drinking of ass’s 
milk, a measure much in vogue in his time, 
in cases of debility or prolonged conva- 


7A creature of Mazarin’s, his real name was 
Particelli. He was finally disgraced and replaced by 
Fouquet. 


‘| 161 


[escence. When Falconet’s wife was recover- 
ing from a serious illness, Patin writes 
(April 8, 1664) urging him to make her 
drink it. He quotes mstances to show Fal- 
conet that drinking ass’s milk is conducive 
to longevity: 


My mother-in-law, who died aged eighty-four 
years of an apoplexy, had drunk it for sixty 
years. The mother of M. du Laurens, the coun- 
cilor, died last year, aged eighty-seven years, 
having used it ever since she was twenty-two 
years of age. Her sister-in-law, the widow of 
André du Laurens, the anatomist, had done the 
same and lived eighty-five years. It works 
marvels here, particularly in the spring and 
autumn, notably when taken with precaution. 
I only give it when the mtestines are clean and 
prepared by good and gentle purgations. 


VENESECTION IN INFANCY AND OLD AGE 


It is hardly to be believed, but Patmin 
asserts to Spon (August 17, 1648): 


We also bleed very fortunately children of 
two or three months, without any incon- 
venience. I can show more than two hundred of 
them bled at this early age. There is not a 
woman in Paris who does not think well of 
bleeding and that her child should be bled in the 


fever of smallpox, scarlet fever (rougeole) or 


‘| 162 |e 


teething, or in convulsions, so much have they 
seen of it by experience when they had them. 


Patin writes Falconet (January 19, 1663): 


I bled another time an infant of three days for 
an erysipelas of the throat. He is still living, 
aged thirty-five years, a captain at Dunkirk, the 
son of Mademoiselle Choart.® I bled the son of 
M. Lambert de Thorigny the sixty-second day 
of his life, who is today ten years old. The 
application of great remedies at so tender an age 
demands much judgment. 


The aged were also suitable subjects for 
profuse bleeding. Patin writes to Falconet 
(May 27, 1659): 


Our good M. Baralis has been bled eleven 
times in six days, which has prevented suffoca- 
tion . . . But he is in great danger of not 
being able to escape it. A continued fever, a bad 
lung besieged with an inflammation, eighty-four 
years, are all signs which leave me with a 
gloomy suspicion. Oh! but it is a pity. He knows 
well his Hippocrates and Galen, and practiced 
medicine as a man of honor all his life. 


THE USE OF ANIMAL REMEDIES 


It is odd that Patin neither recommends 
nor condemns a class of medicines much in 


8 It was quite customary at that time to designate 
a married woman as mademoiselle. 


| 163 } 

vogue in his time, namely those composed of 
animals or their secretions or excretions. 
Dr. Minivielle® gives the followmg list of 
those which the apothecary should keep in 
his shop, according to the ““ Pharmacopoeia” 
of Jean de Renou, published first in 1608 
and again in 1637. 


One uses many entire animals, such as can- 
tharides, centipedes, worms, lizards, ants, vipers, 
scorpions, frogs, crayfish, leeches and many 
small birds. As to the parts (of animals) our 
physicians hold assuredly and truly that they 
are endowed with many and admirable virtues, 
among which parts we can put the skull or 
the head of a man dead but not yet buried; the 
bone which is in the heart of a deer, the brain 
of antelopes, swallows and hares; the teeth 
(tusks) of the boar and the elephant, the heart 
of the frog; the lung of the fox, the liver of the 
goat, the intestines of the wolf; the genitalia of 
the deer; the skin and the slough of the snake. 
Item: fat of man, of the pig, of the goose, of 
sheep, of the duck, the rabbit, the kid, the eel, 
and the snake; the marrow of the deer, the calf 
and the goat; human blood, the blood of the 
pigeon, and of the goat; all sorts of milk and 
that which is made from it, as butter and cheese; 
the horns of the deer, and antelope and the 
unicorn; the toe nails of the eland, the goat and 

® La médecine au temps d’Henri tv. 


J 164 


the buffalo; the shells of oysters and the pearls 
from within them, and the scales of many fish. 
Finally, since the excrements of the said animals 
have also their particular virtues, It Is not 
unfitting for the pharmacist to keep them in his 
shop, especially the dung of the goat, dog, swan, 
peacock, pigeon, muskrat, civet, and the hair 
of certain animals. 


CHAPTER VII 


SOME OF PaTIN’s CONTRIBUTIONS 
TO LITERATURE; PROFESSOR OF MEDICINE 


Patin edited a collection of discourses or 
harangues by Jean Passerat, professor of 
eloquence and Latin poetry in the Collége 
Royal, published in 1637, with a dedica- 
tion to: Charles Guillemeau, written by 
Patin. The edition of Fernel’s “Pathology” 
(Fernelli Pathologiae), published at Paris 
_ In 1638, was prefaced by a dedication three 
pages long by Patin. Patin sometimes 
exhausts even his hyperboles in praise of 
Fernel. As a sample he writes to Falconet 


(March 29, 1656): 


I am ravished that you should so greatly love 
our Fernel. That man is one of my saints, with 
Galen and the late M. Pietre. I told Madame de 
Riaut, the mother of your beautiful nun, that I 
would hold it a greater glory to be descended 
from Fernel than to be King of Scotland, or 
related to the Emperor of Constantinople. 
Fernel was good, wise and learned . . . never 
any prince did so much good to the world as 
Fernel has done. 

[ 165 | 


‘| 166 | 


Fernel, physician to Henri 11, was a truly 
great man. He was interested in astronomy, 
and in 1427, he tried to measure the earth’s 
size by observing the. height of the pole at 
Paris; then proceeding northward until 
Its elevation was increased exactly one 
degree, and ascertaining the distance be- 
tween the stations by the revolutions of the 
wheels of his carriage, he made it 24,480 
Italian miles mn circumference. 

About the middle of the seventeenth 
century a physician of Paris, L. Martin, 
published a translation of “The Regimen 
Sanitatis Salernitanum”’ in burlesque verse, 
dedicated to Scarron. Some bibliographers 
have advanced the theory that the real 
translator was Patin, but Reveillé-Parise 
thinks there is no proof of the assertion. A 
later edition of this translation, published by 
Henault at Paris in 1651, is dedicated to 
Patin. Patin frequently refers to this trans- 
lation, and in a letter to Spon (October 1g, 
1649) tells him that Martin, the translator, 
has shown him some of the pages of the 
proposed work and intends to dedicate it to 
him. 

Writing to Charles Spon (December 3, 
1649) concerning a dedicatory epistle which 
Spon was going to address to Patin as a 


‘| 167 | 

preface to the works of Sennertus, Patin 
gives him a few hints as to what might be 
said about him, such as references to his 
books, his library, his patients, his good 
method of practice, his worthy inclination 
to do right in all things, to serve the public, 
to be neither charlatan nor chemist and 
to have good friends, both in France and in 
foreign countries. 

Patin contributed considerably to various 
editions of the works of Jean Riolan, fils, 
adding tables and aiding in their correction 
for the press, and Triaire thinks it probable 
that he retouched his famous “Curieuses 
recherches sur les écoles en médecine de 
Paris et de Montpellier,” published at 
Paris in 1651. Riolan states himself his 
indebtedness to Patin for his aid in his “‘ En- 
chiridium anatomicum et pathologicum,” 
1648, which he dedicated to Patin. 

Jean Riolan, the elder, who died in 1606, 
was Dean of the Faculté de Médecine from 
1558 to 1559. His son, Jean Riolan, the 
younger (1577-1657), was professor of anat- 
omy and botany at the Collége Royal, and 
physician to Marie de’Medici whose con- 
fidence he betrayed by spying on _ her 
actions for Richelieu. Although he denied 
the circulation of the blood and the existence 


‘| 168 > 


of Iacteal vessels and the lymphatic circula- 
tion, he made some advances, describing 
the fat appendices of the colon, naming the 
hepatic duct, and observing that the 
common bile-duct had but one membrane 
which served as a valve. 

Jean Pecquet announced his discovery of 
the thoracic duct and receptaculum chyli 
m his book ‘Experimenta nova ana- 
tomica,” published in 1651. Riolan, of 
course, combated his views, and Patin 
writes to Belin, fils on October 8, 1653: 
“There is an entirely new book by the 
goodman, M. Riolan, ‘Adversus Pecquetum 
et Pecquetianos,’ which is much approved 
and well received. All those who have read it 
wish well to M. Riolan, and mock the others, 
who are treated in a strange fashion.” 

Elsewhere Patin writes to Spon (March 
26, 1655) and shows his pronounced leaning 
towards empiricism as contrasted with 
scientific research. He says: 


For the new opinion of Pecquet, I do not yet 
make much of it, inasmuch as I can see no 
certain proof of it nor grand utility or nforma- 
tion, ad bene medendum. He who discovered for 
us senna, cassia, and syrup of pale roses, has 
given us much more pleasure and has insulted 
no one, as these others have done M. Riolan 


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‘| 169 | 
and even our profession, against which the letter 
of M. Sorbiére is full of atrocious insults. 

Patin knew Pecquet personally and re- 
cords several interviews which he had had 
with him. 

Triaire quotes from Tallemant des Reaux 
an amusing anecdote about Riolan. He 
was cut for stone in the bladder but some 
time afterwards had a recurrence, for 
which he refused to be cut again. His wife 
concealed Colot, the famous lithotomist, in 
the house. One day Riolan said he felt much 
better and thought he could stand the 
operation, and that he believed he would 
have himself cut if Colot were at hand. 
Thereupon, Colot appeared, and Riolan 
exclaimed that he could not have the opera- 
tion; that he was not ready as he had not 
confessed. “‘AII will fall on us,”’ said Colot, 
“we will be damned for you, but you will 
be cut.”’ He tied him up and cut him and 
then said, ‘““Confess now, if you wish to.” 
““No,” said Riolan, “‘I am too well for that.” 

Patin often speaks with great admiration 
of the skill of the famous family of Colot. 
There were three of them who attained 
great fame as lithotomists. Patin, writing 
to Falconet (May 13, 1659), speaks of 
Javot, also a lithotomist of note, but not in 


‘| 170 | 

Patin’s good books, who had had the mis- 
fortune to lose three patients on whom he 
had operated. “The little Colot has cut 
many others who have recovered. I hope he 
will become as good and successful an oper- 
ator as his father.” 

Patin writes Charles Spon (December 5, 
1656): 


We had here two cousins who were very 
expert men at cutting for stone in the bladder, 
the younger named Gyrault died, aged fifty 
years last July, at Evreux, where he had gone 
to cut a gentleman. He had formerly cut the 
present Pope at Cologne. The other named 
Ph. Colot, aged about fifty-eight years, was a 
peritissimus artifex. He has gone to cut a man 
near la Rochelle, fell ill with dysentery, and 
died at Lusson. Voila today A. Ruffin formerly 
surgeon at la Charité the foremost lithotomist 
of Paris. There are yet others who run after 
this lucrative reputation, as Javot, surgeon 
to la Charité, Govin, of the Hétel-Dieu, and 
another Colot, a cousin of the deceased, who 
was at Bordeaux, but has come here to search 
his fortune. 


Stone m the kidneys or bladder seems to 
have been an exceedingly common com- 
plaint throughout Europe in the seven- 
teenth century. Luther died of it, jestingly 


{| 177 | 

remarking that he was dying the death of 
Saint Stephen. Cutting for vesical calculus 
was a very common operation almost 
exclusively in the hands of a class of special 
operators known as incisors, among whom 
the most illustrious were the Colot family of 
whom Patin so often speaks. His own 
therapeutics in such cases was quite simple. 
In 1649 he writes Falconet, who was a 
sufferer, to refrain from wine, drink plenty 
of water, and be bled six times a year, and as 
often take a purge of cassia and senna with 
syrup of white roses. He tells him it is a dis- 
ease of literary men, litteratorum carnifex. 

Some charlatans pretended to cure stone 
in the bladder by secret remedies or methods, 
without the use of the knife. Patin! tells 
of one named Metiries, who claimed to 
dissolve the stone in the bladder by the 
injection of a certain medicament. He 
extorted enormous fees from his patients, 
claiming that his remedy was extremely 
expensive to make. 


HONORS CONFERRED ON PATIN 


When Riolan oppressed with old age and 
sickness, resigned his chair as professor in the 
Collége Royal, 1654, mn favor of Patin, the 

1Letter to Charles Spon, July 13, 1667. 


1172} 
latter writes Falconet (October 9, 1654) with 
pardonable pride and joy to tell him the 
good news. He is to teach botany, phar- 
macy, and anatomy. 


I will direct all my care to make good scholars 
who should be far from the Arabs and the 
impostures of chemists, who are the ordinary 
persons by whom young physicians are today 
empoisoned, 

I must make you the sharer in some good 
news with which you will not be vexed, that is 
if you do not pity me as one does sometimes 
those one loves, seeing that that which I shall 
tell you of will cause me much labor. It is that 
the goodman, M. Riolan, feeling that he had 
become old and nearly overwhelmed by a 
burden as heavy as Mount Etna, considered 
me above all others worthy to have his place 
as professor royal, and it has been fortunately 
accomplished. M. Amory, bishop of Coutances 
and grand Vicar to M. le Cardinal Antoine, 
grand aumonier de France, received and agreed 
to my nomination by M. Riolan. From them 
we went to M. de la Vrilliére, secretary of state, 
who signed our letters; finally we carried them 
to the gardes des sceaux. M. Riolan alleged his 
reasons to which the former replied that he 
knew M. Riolan very well and his merit, and 
that he knew me also, that he would have them 
sealed next Monday, that we should be present, 


L073, 9 
and he would gladly expedite us. Thus there 
only remain a few ceremonies to observe and 
to take the oath of fidelity at the hands of M. 
the bishop of Coutances. 


Patin writes to Charles Spon (March 2, 
1655) that he began his lectures with the 
following announcement “Guido Patin, doc- 
tor medicus et professor regius rel ana- 
tomicae et pharmaceuticae, clarissimi vir! 
D. Jean Riolani, antecessoris sui, enchi- 
ridium anatomicum et pathologicum expli- 
cabit, ac alequot animadversionibus illus- 
trabit. Initium faciet, die Junae 8 marti 
1645, hora tertia pomeridiana in auditorio 
regio.” 

He describes (March 2, 1655) his intro- 
ductory address: 


It lasted a whole hour but it was not tiresome 
because it was a continuous history of the 
Collége Royal since the year 1529, when it was 
founded by Francois 1, by whose successors the 
institution has been maintained, and governed 
by the grand aumoniers of France. Then I 
talked of the former professors who had ren- 
dered the Collége illustrious, such as Danesius, 
Turnebus, Carpentarius, the Durets, the grand 
Simon Pietre, and those who are yet living, as 
M. Riolan, to whom I testified my gratitude for 
having chosen me as his successor. I saw there 


| 174 | 

some white monks and even four children of the 
fortunate Pére Ignace, I know not how they 
came there without being invited. One of our 
physicians just told me he had returned from 
the College of Cambrai yesterday with one of 
our antimonial companions, from whom he 
demanded what he thought of my harangue. 
The doctor answered that the Latin of it was 
good, but that there was too much idle talk in it, 
that I had deceived him as he had expected that 
I would talk against antimony, but that I had 
said nothing about it. 


Patin gave a sort of postgraduate course 
to his former scholars. He writes Charles 
Spon (September 16, 1650): 


For my conferences for which I employ two 
hours one afternoon a week, they are good 
and can sometimes profit by some words on a 
question or controversy in medicine, but he 
(M. Sorbiére) lost his time when he attended 
them. I am under an obligation to him, as well 
as to the goodness of M. Duprat who did me 
the honor of bringing me such an auditor. If 
I had discovered or seen you there, you would 
have rendered me unable to speak as happened 
to Guillaume Bude before Emperor Charles v. 
They are little light interviews that I take 
pleasure in giving to my old scholars, to fortify 
them in the right method (of practice). 


| 175 F 

Writing (October 8, 1655) to Belin, fils, 
Patin tells him that during the week he had 
made a public dissection of the body of a 
woman who had been executed and that 
his demonstrations had been attended by a 
very large number of students. 

In 1655 Patin was offered a professorship 
at Bologna, with a salary of 2,000 écus, and 
the opportunity of acquiring a large practice 
in that city. He declined, and writes 
Falconet (September 21, 1655): 


Neither ambition nor the desire to become rich 
shall make me quit Paris. Five years ago I 
declined to go to Sweden with much better con- 
ditions. I am cured of the perigrinomanie and the 
philargyrie, or rather I have never been sick 
with them. 


In 1658 the Ambassador of Venice asked 
Patin to go to Venice promising him a 
salary of 6,000 francs a year from the 
Senate of the Republic, and the prospect 
of acquiring a large practice. Patin says 
that his name was suggested to the Ambas- 
sador by de Gorris, one of his pet aversions. 
He declined the offer on the ground of his 
health and his desire not to leave Paris. 
The Ambassador then offered to give the 
appointment to his son, Robert Patin, but 


{176 | 

Guy would not hear of his accepting it, 
stating that it was necessary for his son to 
study five or six years more with him before 
he would be qualified to fill the position. 
He writes Falconet: “Italy is a country of 
syphilis, poisonings, and atheism, of Jews, 
renegades, and the greatest rascals in 
Christendom, all there is monkery and 
hypocrisy.” | 

Patin received an invitation to go to Den- 
mark. He writes Falconet (May 4, 1663): 


M., the Prince of Denmark and M., his 
Ambassador, wish to take me from here, and 
bring me to that cold country. They have 
written to their King, and he has charged them 
to take me. They have made me beautiful offers, 


but I do not wish it. I am neither to be sold nor ~ 


bought. I wish to be buried at Paris near my 
good friends. 


The premier president of the court of the 
Parlement of Paris, Lamoignon, was a great 
personage, and Patin writes Falconet (May 
20, 1659) with evident pride: 


I supped last Saturday with M. le Premier 
Président, where he made great cheer. One 
eats quickly with him and talks little during the 
repast. He wished however, that I should 
drink his health twice in Spanish wine, which 


HEE 


was extraordinarily good. Afterwards I talked 
with him a good hour and a half on various 
things in which he took great delight. He told 
me he was in difficulty how we should manage 
in the approaching summer, that he had wished 
to have leisure to talk with me once a week, an 
entire aprés-diner, and that he feared, for lack of 
leisure, he would forget the little he had learned. 
Two mattres des requétes, who had come there to 
sup because of me, brought me away in their 
carrosse. He told me in parting that he had a 
design to make at his house a little academy, at 
least once a week, but he did not wish we should 
be more than six. Hesignified that I should be one 
and I believe my son, Carolus, will be of it also, 
because M. le Premier Président wishes as much 
good to him as to me. 


It has been asserted, but without proof 
that the premier president used to have a 
louis placed under Guy’s napkin each time 
that he was his guest. Patin, naturally, 
makes no mention of it, and the story 
seems to have been mere gossip. 

Patin writes to Falconet (February 109, 


1659): 


M. le Premier Président sends for me some- 
times to sup with him. He gives me great cheer, 
but his good welcome I value more than all the 
rest. I have promised to sup with him every 


| 178 F 

Sunday in Lent, and later we will take other 
measures, according to the season. There is 
much pleasure with him, because he is the wisest 
man of the long robe (lawyer) in France. He is 
very sage and very civil and says, smiling, that it 
is needless to speak evil of the Jesuits and the 
monks, nevertheless he 1s ravished when some 
bon mot against them escapes me. 


Patin seems to have been a popular Iec- 
turer; at least his lectures were well 
attended. He writes Spon (April 21, 1655): 


I gave my first lecture today in the great hall 
of Cambrai. I had fifty-two scholars who took 
notes, and some (other) auditors . . . The 
same day when I gave my second lecture at 
Cambrai I had by actual count sixty-two 
auditors. As I saw that they enjoyed listening to 
me, I made my exposition last an entire hour, 
and went forth amidst great applause. 


In 1657 he writes Spon that his first lecture 
was attended by ninety persons and his 
second, by one hundred and fifty. 

Patin was on terms of intimate friendship 
with Pierre Gassendi (1592-1655) whom he 
terms ‘“‘an abridgment of all the moral 
virtues and of all the great sciences.”’ He 
also calls him one of the most honest and 
learned men of the day in France. Gassendi 
was a priest and was chiefly distinguished 


‘| 179 | 
as a philosopher and mathematician though 
he was also a good anatomist. 


PATIN S OPINION OF PHYSICIANS 


Charles Saumaise (Salmasius) was a great 
source of admiration to Patin, who terms 
him that “excellent and comparable per- 
sonage’’ in a letter to Spon (October 26, 
1643). Saumaise was born in 1488, and died 
in 1658. He was not a physician but a 
philosopher and theologian. Like most of the 
savants of his time he dabbled occasionally 
in medical matters. To English readers he is 
most familiar as the antagonist of John 
Milton in a pamphlet war, mn which Sau- 
maise supported the Stuart cause. He was a 
Huguenot, but nevertheless Richelieu sought 
to attach him to his services. 

Patin was greatly wrought up by hearing 
the statement made that Saumaise had 
spoken ill of physicians, so he writes to 
Spon? that he has searched the writings 
of Saumaise to discover the place where he 
did so. He discovered that in writing of 
Attic and Roman law, Saumaise had re- 
ferred to physicians as being mercenary. 
Patin says he is wrong to do so because 
on an occasion when Saumaise had been 

2 September 12, 1645. 


‘| 180 | 


ill in Paris, he had been attended by physi- 
cians who, after saving him from the hands 
of a charlatan into which he had fallen, had 
declined to accept any pay for their services 
to him. He attributes the statement made 
by Saumaise to the fact that he had lost 
three children in one year, of smallpox, 
while living in Holland, due, thinks Patin, 
to the “rude and gross” methods of practice 
among the physicians of that country. 

He is astonished that Saumaise should 
have expressed such an opimion. He adds 
that he only augments the number of those 
who have done so, of whom Pliny is chief. 


As to Michel de Montaigne, of whom I make 
great case, he has honored doctors personally by 
his approbation, and has only attacked their 
profession; and nevertheless he has been 
too hasty; if he had lived ninety or one hundred 
years before condemning medicine, he would 
have had some color of reason, but having been 
sickly from early youth, and having lived only 
seventy years® It Is necessary to acknowledge 
that he paid the debt too soon; wise travelers 
only mock the dogs of the village after they are 
got to a distance, and when they cannot be 
bitten. 


’ Montaigne died when only fifty-nine. He was 
born in 1533 and died in 1592. 


4] 181 


Patin’s own cynicism about members of 
his profession is shown in the following 
passage: 


I will say, to the shame of my art if doc- 
tors were only paid for the good that they 
actually do, they would not gain so much, but 
we profit from the foolishness of women, from 
the weakness of sick men, and from the credulity 
of everybody. , 


Yet he writes Falconet (November 4, 1650): 


I will never speak insultingly of a doctor of 
medicine, because of the honor I bear to the 
profession, but I avow to you that all the 
chemists (Van Helmont, Guénault, etc.) that I 
have known until now have been poor vaga- 
bonds, boasters, braggarts, and liars, or very 
Ignorant impostors. 


Patin refers again to those who have 
written against physicians in a letter to 
Spon (October 19, 1649), mentioning that 
among those who had done so were the 
elder Pliny, Montaigne, and Agrippa. He 
says that in the month of February, 1617, 
the cold was so intense that his father and 
mother took him home from College, as 
they feared he would not be as warm there 
as by their fireside. 


| 182 | 


I remember that this little vacation was very 
agreeable to me, and being near a great fire 
much to my comfort, where the wood cost 
nothing, I read nearly all of a folio among the 
books of my late father, which was the “Com- 
mentaries’’ of Blaisede Montluc . . . He writes 
of pests and plagues, and declaims therein very 
rudely against the great number of physicians, 
advocates, and procurers, whom he calls the 
vermin of the palace . . . A gentleman named 
Rampole made here an academic discourse in 
which he extended himself greatly against the 
inutility of a very great number of men of 
letters in a state, wherein he spared neither 
physicians nor others. I avow veritably that 
there are in France too many priests, monks and 
ministers of chemistry, I mean procurers and 
lawyers of all kinds. I do not even doubt that in 
the country and in the small towns there are too 
many physicians, and that many of them are 
very ignorant. In Amiens, which is a small city 
desolated by wars and the passage of armies, 
there are today twenty physicians. But those of 
whom there are undoubtedly too many in 
France are the monks and the apothecaries, who 
cut miserably the purse and throat of many 
poor people. In recompense there are very few 
good and wise physicians who have been well 
educated and taught. I see them even here, gut 
malunt errare quam doceri, although they have 
good means to amend themselves. As to the 


[| 183 | 

country, it is overrun with miserable physicians, 
qui de se nihil nisi magnifice sentiunt, because 
they have dipped their noses in Perdulcis, of 
whom they only understand half the terms, or 
they have heard tell of diamargaritum, of 
apozemes, of cordial juleps, and of vin émé- 
tique. The principal cause of this misfortune is 
the too great ease with which the little uni- 
versities make doctors. They give parchments 
too easily for money at Angers, Caen, Valence, 
Aix, Toulouse, and Avignon. It is an abuse 
which merits punishment since it redounds to 
the detriment of the public, but by misfortune 
we are not in a state of amendment . . . But 
perhaps God will finally have pity on us, and 
will change these things. 


Patin was himself the object of several 
literary attacks. He describes to Charles 
Spon (January 6, 1654) a Iittle book 
entitled “‘ Bibliotheca Patinici,” which was 
written in 1630 by Victor Pallu, a physician 
of Tours, in which he says he got off lightly 
but that some of the other physicians 
of Paris, notably Nicolas Pietre, Merlet and 
Moreau were very badly treated. The 
book was probably privately printed as 
Patin says that it was very rare. It was 
anonymous and Pallu’s authorship was only 
discovered by the efforts of Moreau, who 


| 184 | 

pardoned him at the intercession of his 
friends, though many other physicians bore 
him much ill will for his malicious attack. 
Pallu got into trouble also with his col- 
leagues in Tours, so he left that city and 
went to Sedan, where he became physician 
to the Comte de Soissons. After the death 
of the latter in 1641, Pallu came to Paris 
where Patin says he dined with him twice. 
Patin speaks as though they were on per- 
fectly good terms, though he says “the 
public lost nothing when he died,” m 
1647. 

Patin in a letter to Charles Spon (Septem- 
ber 17, 1649) mentions that he had heard 
that a physician of Montpellier, named 
Arnauld, was about to publish a book 
against him entitled “‘Patinus fustigatus.” 
He says that this news neither astounds him 
nor surprises him, but that while he is 
obliged to wait for its appearance he would 
like to know something about its author, 
his quality, his age, and his object in writing, 
if he writes in defence of the chemists or 
the apothecaries or to refute Patin’s thesis, 
or against his person and manners: “If 
he insults me I will let him alone and pardon 
him; if he says what ts true and right so that 
I can learn something I will thank him; if he 


‘| 185 | 
merits an answer I promise him one, 
provided that I have the leisure.” Of 
course it should be remembered that none 
of Patin’s letters had been published at this 
time. 

On October 16, 1650 he agam writes to 
Charles Spon that he hears that the book 
against him ts to be a large quarto. “Each 
page is headed Patinus verberatus, a title 
manifestly satiric, sulting, scandalous and 
defamatory. I wish you would tell them that 
I believe that it is necessary to act against 
him and the printer, nomine injuriam, this 
title bemg purely defamatory. I am curious 
to know why this man Is angry at me, and 
what wrong I ever did to him or his.” 


CONTROVERSY WITH RENAUDOT 


Among the most interesting controversies 
in which Patin engaged was the famous one 
between Théophraste Renaudot, “the 
gazetteer,’ and the Faculte de Médecine. 
Renaudot presents an interesting character 
study as a quack whose intelligence led him 
to institute really big things, though it is 
very open to question, whether he himself 
realized their utility, and he certainly could 
not have anticipated their subsequent devel- 


‘| 186 > 


opments. Born at Loudun about 1586, he 
received the degree of Doctor of Medicine at 
Montpellier in 1606. He became acquainted 
with the famous Joseph Francois Leclerc, 
Marquis de Tremblay, more generally 
known as Pére Joseph, a Capuchin monk, 
who was Cardinal Richelieu’ s right hand 
man and the only human being in whom he 
seems to have had implicit confidence. Renau- 
dot went to live at Paris in 1612, with the 
strongest recommendations from Pére Jo- 
seph to Richelieu. These led to the latter 
procuring for him the appointment of 
physician-in-ordinary to the King, Louis 
xu. He became a favorite of Louis, and 
speedily procured the royal authority, 
backed by a decree of the Parlement of 
Paris, to establish a bureau d’addresses, or 
sort of employment agency, to which he 
added a pawnshop, or Mont-de-Piété, where 
money was advanced on the salaries of the 
borrowers, and also a free dispensary, or 
consultations charitables, all of which estab- 
lishments are fully described in a pamphlet 
entitled “‘Inventaire de bureau de rencontre 
ou chacun peut donner ou recevoir avis de 
toutes les nécessités et commodités de la vie 
et société humaine,” published at Paris in 
1620. The following year he began the pub- 


[| 187 | 
lication of a newspaper, The Gazette, the first 
French newspaper. 

Readers of Cyrano de Bergerac will recall 
the scene in the second act in the restaurant 
of Ragueneau, when the crowd is over- 
whelming Cyrano with congratulations on 
his victory over his hundred assailants at 
the porte de Vesle. He is approached by a 
“man of letters” with a writing case, who 
asks him if he can have the details of the 
contest. Cyrano repulses him, whereupon 
his friend, Le Bret, tells him: ‘‘He is Théo- 
phraste Renaudot! the mventor of The 
Gazette.”’ 


Cette feuille ou I’on fait tant de chose tenir! 
On dit que cette idée a beaucoup d’avenir! 


Those of us who are interested in Guy 
Patin can only express our regret that 
the great French poet did not see fit to 
make him likewise a figurant with his 
antagonist. 

He shortly afterwards ran foul of the 
Faculte de Médecine by attempting to 
establish, with the connivance and assist- 
ance of the doctors of Montpellier and the 
apothecaries, a rival school of medicine. 
The attempt was fraught with danger to the 
eminence of the Faculté, and they at once 


{ 188 } 


entered upon a fierce struggle with the 
audacious Renaudot, who, backed by the 
formidable friendship and favor of the King 
and Cardinal, put up a good fight. The 
death of Richelieu on December 4, 1642, was 
fatal to. Renaudot’s chances. In March, — 
1643, Patin wrote to Spon that “‘he had 
folded his baggage” since the death of his 
chief support. In the same letter he refers 
contemptuously to a recent publication of 
Renaudot’s “‘La présence des absents, ou 
facile moyen de rendre présent au médecin 
"état d’un malade absent. Dressé par le 
docteur consultant charitablement 4 Paris, 
pour les pauvres malades” in which he dis- 
courses on a method of treatment by corre- 
spondence which he had organized and 
which as Triaire remarks has certainly 
not been equaled by contemporary charla- 
tans, nor, we might add, by the Christian 
Scientists. 

Before his death, Richelieu had accorded 
to Renaudot a large amount of Jand in the 
faubourg St. Antoine, ostensibly for the 
consultations charitables, but Triaire states 
that the ground was really intended for the 
purposes of the school of medicine which 
Renaudot proposed to found in opposition 
to the Faculté de Médecine. The Cardinal 


‘| 189 F 
hated the University of Paris because it 
possessed certain rights and privileges which 
were In opposition to the royal power,‘ 
by means of which its professors and stu- 
dents were often not amenable to the des- 
potic power Richelieu wished to wield, Triaire 
thinks that the Cardinal backed Renaudot 
in his scheme with the deliberate purpose of 
destroying or, at least, lessening the power 
of the Faculté de Médecine. This explains 
the extreme animosity of the physicians 
toward Renaudot and the ardor with which 
they pursued the fight agamst him. The 
contest was not just with a successful char- 
latan, but against the despotism of the 
all powerful Minister, and it ts little wonder 
that we find Patin breathing a sigh of relief 


4 Among other privileges claimed by the Faculté 
de Médecine of Paris, was that of exemption from 
military service. In 1634, the Spanish and German 
armies invaded France and succeeded in capturing 
Corbie, only thirty-three leagues from Paris. The 
country rallied patriotically. All the great bodies of 
the state subscribed to the fund raised by Paris, 
which also raised 28,000 men. The Faculté gave 
1,000 écus. Patin writes to Belin, August 29, 1636, 
that the Faculté de Médecine claimed its exemption 
from military service on account of exemptions often 
confirmed in its registers. He adds that he himself has 
subscribed 12 écus to the fund raised by the Faculté. 


4 190 f 
at Richelieu’s death, “il est en plomb, 
?éminent personnage.””® 
In a letter to Spon (March, 1643) Patin 

again joyfully refers to the great man’s 
decease. “The Gazetteer is living with 
Guillot Ie Songeur since the death of his 
inspirer (protocale) who held him up against 
us. But, God be thanked, he has folded his 
baggage.” 

II est en plomb, I’excellent personnage 

Qui a nos maux a ri plus de vingt ans. 


Patin writes to Spon® some details of the 
last illness and autopsy of Richelieu. The 
Cardinal died on December 4, 1642, after 


5 This is a quotation from a rondeau written by 
Miron which Triaire gives: 


“TI est passé, il a plié bagage, 
Ce Cardinal, dont c’est moult grand dommage, 
Pour sa maison. C’est comme je I’entends; 
Car pour autrui, maint hommes sont content; 
En bonne foi, et n’en voie que I’image, 
Sous sa faveur il enrichit son linguage, 
Par dons, par vols, par fraude et mariage, 
Mais aujourd’hui, il n’est plus le temps, 
II est passe. 
Or, parlerons sans crainte d’étre en cage. 
II est en plomb, I’éminent personnage 
Qui de nos maux a ri plus de vingt ans.” 


6 December, 1642. 


{ 191 | 

only six days of acute illness, though he had 
been very feeble and in poor health for a 
long time. During the preceding summer he 
had been in the south of France busied in 
suppressing the insurrection of Cinq-Mars. 
He returned to Paris in a litter on October 
17th. While absent he had been operated 
upon for an abscess of the rectum. Patin 
says that a few days before Richelieu’s 
death, in desperation he had submitted to 
the ministrations of a female empiric, who 
had given him horses’ dung m white wine, 
and that another charlatan had given him a 
pull containing opium, because he did not 
think that the treatment by his regular 
physicians had been after the most approved 
manner. Triaire’ quotes from a contem- 
porary account of Richelieu’s last days: 


November 28th the Cardinal was taken with 
a violent chill and pain in the side. Bouvard 
summoned, bled him twice in the night of 
Sunday or Monday, but the patient spat blood 
and his fever increased. From Monday to 
Tuesday the pain having augmented, they prac- 
ticed two new bleedings. Tuesday, December 
2nd, a consultation was held at which it was 
decided to make a new emission of blood, and to 
have recourse to purgatives. The fever having 


7 Lettres de Gui Patin, Paris, 1907, footnote, 1, 145. 


| 192 | 
redoubled in the evening they made two more 
bleedings. On Wednesday, December 3rd, an 
empiric of Troyes named Lefevre, was called in 
and administered a pilule which seemed to give 
a little relief. Finally, Thursday, December 
4th, the seventh day of the illness, the Cardinal 
was seized with cold sweats, and died at noon. 


At the autopsy the brain was found to be of 
unusual size. 

It is curious how frequently autopsies 
were performed at that time. Patin’s letters 
describe many of them. Pic® conjectures it 
was because of the frequency with which the 
deaths of prominent personages were as- 
cribed to poisoning, but this seems doubtful 
as they were performed in many instances 
in cases where no such suspicion could have 
been entertained. This may have been the 
reason that the bodies of the Kings of 
France were always subjected to an official 
post-mortem examination, but would hardly 
suffice to explain the frequency of the exam- 
ination of the bodies of private individuals. 

Richelieu was a dangerous antagonist. 
The war was conducted chiefly through the 
medium of virulent pamphlets. As Patin 
writes to Belin n May, 1641, if “the Gazet- 
teer,’ as be terms Renaudot, had not been 

§ Guy Patin, Paris, 1o1t. 


‘| 193 | 

sustained by his Eminence, the Faculté 
would have instituted a criminal process 
against him, but it would have been doomed 
to failure against such influence. Michel 
de Ia Vigne, Moreau, Riolan, Patin and 
other members of the Faculté wrote tracts 
in which Renaudot was excoriated and held 
up to contempt. Richelieu ordered them to 
cease. 

Renaudot seems to have been particularly 
stung by the attacks of Guy Patin, who had 
termed him “nebulo” and “blatero,” a 
nebulous braggart. He had Patin summoned 
before the Maitre des requétes, and it is sad 
but true that Guy only extricated himself 
from the charge of libel by asseverating that 
the terms as he used them were intended to 
be applied to Guy de Ia Brosse, the founder 
of the Jardin du Roi, and not to Renaudot. 
The latter, not to be thwarted, got a sister 
of de Ila Brosse, who was dead, to sue Patin 
before the Juges de requétes de [ Hotel. At the 
trial of the process Patin distinguished him- 
self by addressing the court in his own 
behalf for hours, “with an eloquence, erudi- 
tion, and esprit”? which made the judges 
marvel. 

They gave judgment for Patin on August 
14, 1642, and needless to say he was greatly 


[194 | 

elated at his trrumph. The Faculté pro- 
ceeded actively against Renaudot, after he 
was deprived of his powerful protectors, 
the King and Richelieu. They took the 
matter up before the Chatelet, accusing 
Renaudot of practicing medicine illegally, 
and procured an order by which Renaudot 
and his associates were commanded to 
cease their enterprises. Renaudot appealed 
to the court of the Parlement of Paris, which 
august body on March 1, 1644, also ren- 
dered a verdict against him. Thenceforth, 
he passed mto obscurity and no longer 
troubled the repose of the Faculte. 

One method of expressing his contempt of 
Renaudot which Patin used, appears some- 
what undignified as well as laborious. On 
September 17, 1643, Patin caused a Bachelor 
of Medicine named Courtois to sustain be- 
fore the Faculté, a thése which Patin had 
written, ‘“‘Est-ne totus homo a natura 
morbus” (Do the maladies of man all come 
from nature?). It had a great success, six 
editions being printed. In a letter to Spon 
(December 24, 1643) he tells him that he has 
sent him a copy, and directs his attention to 
a passage where, in writing of diseases of the 
nose, he will find after the word nebulones 
the name of Renaudot, by taking the first 


‘| 195 F 
letter of each word of the eight following. I 
give the transcription of the passage as 
illustrative of a far-fetched seventeenth 
century witticism: 


Corruptum nasum sequitur corruptio morum; 
existo enim masonum genere, qui, ancidulo ore 
loquuntur, nebulones sunt, Ridiculi, Effranaei, 
Nefarn, Ardeliones, Vafri, Dolosi, Obscent 
Turbulenti, mendaces, maligni, mvidi, quad- 
ruplatores flagitiosi, infames, contumeliosi, 
faccinorosi. 


Writing to Spon (1650) of his great 
admiration for the poems of Ovid (Ovidius 
Naso), he says: 


Ovid was a bel esprit and I would willingly 
reread his works if I had the time. For his sur- 
name Naso it pleases me by the sympathy which 
I have for the big nosed, and the hatred I bear 
to the flat (camus) which are nearly all stinking 
and filthy, as “The Gazetteer,” Théophraste 
Renaudot, against whom I gained the beautiful 
process on August 14, 1642. Thus I remember 
in going forth from the Palace (palais de justice) 
that day, I approached him, saying, “M. 
Renaudot, you can console yourself because you 
have gained in losing.” “How then?” said he. 
“Tt is,’ said I to him, “because flat nosed when 


{ 196 } 
you entered here, you are going out with a foot 
more of nose.’”® 


Renaudot responded to Patin’s personali- 
ties by equally sharp replies. Because of the 
fact that Patin confined his therapeutic 
measures almost entirely to bleeding (la 
saignée), syrup of roses and senna, he was 
nicknamed “Doctor Three S’s.” 

Renaudot refers to this in the following 
epigram: 

Nos docteur de Ia Faculté, 
Aux malades parfois s’il rendent la santé, 
Ont besoin de l’apothicaire; 


Mais Patin s’en dispense et, plein de dignité, 
Avec trois S les enterré. 


Patin!® tells how the Faculté scored on 
‘““The Gazetteer”’ in one instance. A rich old 
abbé, who was one of Richelieu’s attendants, 
had been attended by Renaudot during an 
attack of gout. Renaudot gave him a 
powerful purgative which aggravated his 
attack. The abbe discharged him and put 
himself in the care of a member of the 
Faculté, who cured him. The old gentleman 
felt so grateful that he gave the Faculté 

® The French have a proverbial expression applic- 
able to one who is humiliated or chagrined that he 
has received un pied de nez. 

10 T_etter to Spon, March 28, 1643. 


‘| 197 | 
10,000 écus towards rebuilding. Patin 
writes: “‘“The Gazetteer’ from whom this 
prey has escaped has too good a heart to 
break over it, but however, I do not doubt 
that he is much vexed.” 

Renaudot was obliged to give up his 
consultations charitables, his project for a 
college of medicine and his pawnshop, but 
permitted to continue his bureau d’addresses 
and The Gazette. He died on October 25, 1553.0 
His two sons, Isaac and Eusebius, both 
became members of the Faculté de Méde- 
cine, but only after a decree of the Parle- 
ment of Paris in 1642 had ordered their 
admission, which order was not complied 
with by the Faculté until 1647 or 1648. 
They continued to publish The Gazette, but 
before taking the oath required for the 
doctorate, were obliged to give up the 
bureau d’addresses and disavow the conduct 
of their father, in an oath taken before a 
notary. 


CHAPTER VIII 


PaTIN EXPERIENCES OPPOSITION 


THE PHYSICIANS OF PARIS VERSUS THOSE 
OF MONTPELLIER 


In a letter to Belin (June 9, 1644) Patin, 
summing up his opinion of Renaudot, says: 


The Gazetteer could not confine himself to 
medicine, which he never practiced, having 
always sought to make his living by some other 
occupation such as schoolmaster, author, pedant, 
spy on the Huguenots, gazetteer, usurer, 
chemist, etc. The occupation he followed last 
was the practice of medicine, which he never 
knew; he is a braggart, and an ardelio, of whom 
the crest has been lowered by the decree which 
we, the Faculté de Médecine, have not obtained 
by our power but by the justice and goodness 
of our cause, which was founded on a policy 
necessary In so great a city against the irrup- 
tion of so many barbarians who have practiced 
swindling here in place of medicine. 


In a footnote, Triaire! points out that 
this passage refers to physicians who were 
not members of the Faculté de Médecine 

1 Lettres de Gui Patin, Paris, 1907. 

[ 198 | 


| 199 | 

of Paris, an especially large number being 
graduates of Montpellier, who came to 
Paris and tried to establish themselves 
there in practice. The provost of Paris 
decided on December 9, 1643, and his order 
was affirmed by the Court of the Parlement 
of Paris (March 1, 1644), that no one should 
practice medicine in Paris who was not a 
doctor or licentiate of the Faculté de Méde- 
cine of Paris or an agrégé. By an old decree 
of November 5, 1504, exception was made 
for those who were physicians to the 
King or royal princes, or the greater nobility, 
during such time as the Court was in resi- 
dence in Paris or its environs. After its 
great victory over Renaudot, the Faculté 
became so assured of its power that it 
refused to register the physicians to the 
duc d’ Orléans and the prince de Condé. 

This apparent illiberality was not con- 
fined to the Faculté de Médecine of Paris. 
While the physicians of Montpellier were 
trying to exercise the right to practice 
their profession in Paris, in spite of the 
statutes of the Faculté, they, at the same 
time, were prohibiting the practice of 
medicine at Montpellier by outside physi- 
cians by virtue of an ordinance of Louis 
x11 dating back to 1496. 


‘| 200 | 


In a letter to Spon (December 6, 1644), 
Patin accuses the Faculté at Montpellier 
of selling its degree of Doctor of Medicine, 
and says that many who have begun their 
studies at Paris, go later to Montpellier 
and purchase their degrees. He adds that 
he scarcely knows of an illustrious physician 
of Montpellier and humorously quotes: 
‘“‘parturiunt montes, nascetur ridiculus 
mus.” He then states that their fame was 
due to their knowledge of Arabic medicine, 
Guy’s pet aversion, and that any real 
knowledge they had was derived from Paris. 
“We have for antiquity the greatest number 
of physicians to the kings, and the greatest 
men who have most profited the public by 
the excellent writings which they have left 
us.” 

It is rather curious to find Patin men- 
tioning the position of court physician as 
a distinction. “There were scarcely any 
illustrious physicians of Montpellier before 
Rondelet, who had studied at Paris and 
owed his learning to our schools.”’ Rondelet 
is frequently referred to by Patin in terms 
of respect. He was an eminent anatomist 
who for lack of other available anatomical 
material, dissected the body of his own dead 
child before his class at Montpellier. 


‘| 201 | 


In the same letter Guy writes most venom- 
ously of two physicians of Montpellier, 
Heroard and Vautier. The former was first 
physician to Louis x1, and from his 
journal, which has been preserved, concern- 
ing the health of the king, we learn he was 
a very wise and skilful man; but Guy says 
he lost no opportunity to hit at the Faculté, 
probably because that august body was 
always jealous of his position and anxious 
to belittle him. Vautier was first physician 
to Louis x1v and Patin says he prided 
himself on three things, namely; chemistry, 
astrology, and the philosopher’s stone, 
- “but one does not cure the sick by these 
beautiful secrets. Hippocrates and Galen 
are the beautiful secrets of our profession, 
which he perhaps has never read.” Vautier 
had been physician to Mazarin, and Patin 
states his belief that he will never be made 
premier médecin to the king because Riche- 
lieu in the plenitude of his power had never 
dared have his physician, Charles, ap- 
pointed to the king in this capacity. Patin 
was disappointed in his prognostication, 
for Vautier was appointed, as we have said, 
first physician to Louis x1v. Vautier had 
been first physician to Marte de’ Medici 
and had great mfluence over her. He was 


‘| 202 | 


imprisoned durimg the reign of Louis x11 for 
his participation in some of her conspiracies. 
Patin says, ““M. Vautier condemns our 
Faculté sufficiently often. He says we have 
only bleeding and senna, and boasts of his 
having great chemical secrets. He gives anti- 
mony boldly in any illness, even to children.” 

Patin? expresses very fully his opinion 
of the superiority of the medical school of 
Paris over Its ancient rival of Montpellier. 
He says that the two most famous physi- 
cians of Montpellier were Laurent Joubert 
and Guillaume Rondelet, both of whom 
wrote works on medicine which were merely 
compilations of their. lectures, and that 
Rondelet’s celebrated “Histoire des pois- 
sons” according to de Thou, was not even 
written by him but by Guillaume Pelicier. 
All the rest of the writings of the professors 
of Montpellier are merely foolish pedantic 
lectures, especially those of Rtviére, in 
which there is much charlatanry: “They 
are a stinking marsh of ignorance.and artful 
impostures.”’ Patin excepts Varandeus from 
his condemnations. 


But what comparison is there between all 
these men with Fernel, Sylvius, L. Duret, 


* Letter to Belin, fils, September 7, 1654. 


{ 203 } 
Tagault, the two Pietres, Jean Duret, the Jean 
Martins, E. Gourmelen, Baillou, the elder 
Gorens, who the late M. de Bourbon said was 
more learned in Greek than even Galen; with 
the two Riolans, with a Guillaume Duval, 
with the late M. de la Vigne, all prodigies of 
learning by their polymathy and incomparable 
men in their practice. 


Patin refers frequently to the efforts 
made by the physicians of Montpellier 
to have their right to practice at Paris 
established. On September 12, 1646, he 
writes Belin that they have presented a 
request to the Council by Monsieur Vautier 
which was rejected, the Chancellor stating 
that the decree of 1644 was only a confirma- 
tion of the ancient privileges of the Faculté 
de Médecine, given after the parties to it 
had been heard in five public hearings, and 
that rt must stand. Guy adds: 


In other times foreign (not Parisian) physi- 
cians wishing to practice, called themselves chem- 
ists, spagyrics, Paracelsists, boasting to cure 
the worst diseases without bloodletting, and 
tO possess great secrets against all sorts of 
diseases, but today, we see here very ignorant 
strangers and charlatans who have no shame, 
and brazenly state that they are physicians of 
the Faculté of Montpellier. 


‘| 204 F 

Many of Patin’s letters are in the same 
strain and the repetition grows somewhat 
monotonous. Courtaud, dean of Montpel- 
lier, felt so aggrieved by the attack on the 
physicians of his school m the Renaudot 
controversy that he took up the latter’s 
cudgels and wrote a most violent tirade 
against the Faculté de Médecine of Paris 
and against Patin. This gave rise to further 
replies on their part, one by Riolan. 


OPPOSITION TO THE USE OF ANTIMONY 


Patin’s attitude as regards the use of 
antimony was not simply, as so often repre- 
sented, a blind hatred of the remedy, or 
due solely to the fact that its use was 
popular. He writes to Spon (June 2, 1645) 
that he considers it (and we must say justly 
so) a very dangerous and pernicious remedy 
except in the hands of physicians who are 
both judicious and experienced and that it is 
rightly considered dangerous because its 
use has become widespread in the hands 
of barbers and quacks whereby many 
people have been killed. | 

This opposition to the use of antimony 
got Patin into trouble during his term of 
service as dean of the Faculté de Médecine. 
One, Jean Chartier, a member of the Faculté, 





HARDOUIN DE SAINT-JACQUES, A PSEUDO-DOYEN OF THE 
FACULTE DE MEDECINE IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY 


er teatie 


THE LIBRARY 
OFTHE = 
WEEReTY OF erwets 





uY ' sf a — = 


J 205 

having published a work advocating its 
use without having previously submitted 
it for the approval of the Faculté, Patin 
arbitrarily removed his name from the list 
of members of the Faculté. Chartier brought 
a complaint against Patin in the court of 
the Parlement of Paris. This august body 
having decided against Patin, reestablished 
Chartier m his membership, and con- 
demned Patin to pay a large part of 
the cost of the process. This decree was 
rendered in 1653. 

Patin wrote Spon (November 25, 1653) 
that judgment had been rendered against 
him through the influence of Guénault, and 
that the Queen had used her power to aid his 
enemies. 

According to Bayle, Patin made a great 
register of those whom he claimed had died 
through the administration of antimony to 
them. He proposed to publish it under the 
title ““Le martyrologie de I’antimoine.” 

It will be recalled that Moliére in ‘“‘Le 
médecin malgré lui’ .puts in the mouth of 
the young peasant, who comes to consult 
Sganarelle, the remark that an apothecary 
had wished to give his sick mother some 
vin émétique (antimony) but that he fears 
it will kill her, “as they say these great 


“| 206 | 


doctors kill I do not know how many 
people with that invention.” 

Patin® says that the controversy about 
antimony was largely maintained by the 
action of Hardouin Saint-Jacques, because 
without consultmg the Faculty he had 
included vin émétique in his “Codex medica- 
mentarius,” and to sustain Its inclusion had 
falsified the Registers of the Faculty for 
the year 1637, as had been publicly dem- 
onstrated by Merlet, Perreau, and Blondel, 
in spite of which Hardouin Saint-Jacques 
was never punished. In 1657 he writes 
Spon that Hardouin Saint-Jacques has 
broken his left arm by a fall from his 
horse: “It was he whose perfidy is the 
cause of all the disorder which has befallen 
our Faculty in regard to antimony, because 
bering Dean in the year 1638, to favor the 
apothecaries, a quibus lucrum sperabat, he 
falsified the registers of the Faculty, but 
he has not heard the end of it.”” Hardouin 
Saint-Jacques according to Patin‘ had for- 
merly been a comedian, having acted at the 
Hotel de Bourgogne. 

Patin’s correspondence contains Innum- 
erable references to the deaths of prominent 


§ Letter to Charles Spon, 1655. 
4 Letter to Falconet, December 19, 1660. 


‘| 207 F 

persons which he claims were due to anti- 
mony. A typical instance is one he details 
to Spon (December 6, 1650). M. d’ Avaux, 
one of the superintendents of finances, was 
ill with some pulmonary trouble. Pietre, 
Seguin, and Brayer were treating him, 
but a relative (as sometimes happens even 
today) interfered and insisted that he 
should be seen by Vautier. The latter 
promised to cure him with a beverage he 
would give him. 


The poor man swallowed the antimony on the 
good faith and standing of M. Vautier. An hour 
afterwards he commenced to cry that he was 
burning and that he saw that he had been 
poisoned, that he was sorry that they had 
allowed him to take the remedy, and that he 
regretted that he had not made his will. Then 
the poison having ravished his entrails, he died 
vomiting, three hours after having taken it. 


According to Patin many said that 
Mazarin had had him poisoned as he was 
a bitter enemy of his. The day after Vautier 
was calling on de Maisons, the other super- 
intendent of finance, when the latter said 
to him with pleasing candor, “ Voila, two 
superintendents of finance that-antimony 
has killed this year. I pray you do not 


‘| 208 


make me the third.” He referred to the 
deaths of d’Esmery and d’Avaux. 

Patin in a letter to Spon (April 10, 1644) 
recounts: “Two days ago Guénault and des 
Fougerais gave ther Vin émétique to a 
maitre des comptes named de la Grange, who 
died of rt. All this made much noise here 
at the expense of the reputation of these two 
executioners, who scarcely worry about it.” 

Antimony was usually administered as 
vin émetique. Patin in a letter to Spon 
(January 8, 1650) says: “Vin émétique is 
ordinarily nothing but an infusion of Crocus 
metallorum in white wine. As for the anti- 
mony goblet, it is more than twenty years 
since I have seen one, nevertheless the late 
M. Guénault had one which he used some- 
times.” Antimony cups or goblets, pocula 
emitica, had a great vogue in the seven- 
teenth century. From the traditional origin 
of the name antimony one would have 
thought Patin would have been an advocate 
of its use. The metal, first known as stibium, 
was.used as a medicine, especially by Para- 
celsus in the sixteenth century, but was in- 
troduced into wider medical use in a work 
entitled: ‘“‘Currus trrumphalis antimoni,” 
purporting to have been written by a monk, 
named Basil Valentine, which was published 


‘| 209 

in 1604. It is believed by most historians 
that no such person as Monk Basil ever ex- 
isted, and that the name was chosen as a 
pseudonym by Johann Thilde, a Thuringian 
chemist. The author of the book alleges that 
he had observed that some pigs which had 
eaten food containing antimony, became 
very fat. He was led by this observation 
to try what its effect would be on some 
monks who had become very much ema- 
ciated as the result of prolonged fasting. 
Horribile dictu! They all died. Hence the 
name of stibium became replaced by the 
designation of antimoine, antagonistic to 
monks. Certainly if there is anything in a 
name Guy should have been an antimoni- 
alist of the most determined kind. 

The history of the controversy about 
antimony is very curious and interesting. 
It raged at Paris for over one hundred 
years, dividing the profession into two 
camps, the antimonialists and the anti- 
antimonialists. It was waged not only m 
the conclaves of the Faculte but m the 
courts of law, and it caused the bitterest 
personal animosities and _ recrimmations. 
After the publication of Valentine’s book 
antimony became so popular and was used 
with such recklessness, that there were un- 


‘| 210 | 


doubtedly many fatalities from Its improper 
administration. This led the Faculté to 
issue two decrees, in 1566 and in 1615, 
which were confirmed by the court of the 
Parlement of Paris, declarmg antimony 
a poison and reprehending its administra- 
tion. Notwithstanding these solemn denun- 
clations many physicians mm Paris, even 
members of the Faculté, continued to 
prescribe it. It must have been a sad blow 
for Guy when in 1666, the antimonialists 
finally trrumphed, and the use of antimony 
as a medicine was formally admitted by 
the Faculté, and ordained by a decree of the 
Parlement of Paris. The vote repealing 
the decrees against it, and admitting it 
to the pharmacopeia was carried by forty- 
eight members of the Faculté, against eight. 
Poor Guy writes Falconet (July 30, 1666): 


The cabal of the Iast assembly has wronged 
its reputation. These gentlemen say that a 
poison is not poison in the hands of a good 
physician. They speak against their own experi- 
ence, because most of them have killed their 
wives, their children, and their friends. How- 
ever that may be, they speak well of a drug 
which they dare not taste themselves. I console 
myself because it is necessary that there should 
be heresies so that the truth may be proved, but 


‘| 211 

I have never been of the humor to worship the 
golden calf, nor to consider fortune (wealth) as 
a goddess. God preserve me from it in the future. 
I am content with the mediocrity of mine. 
Peace and little! When the wind shall change, 
all these champions of antimony will scatter 
like the smoke from their furnace. 


As would be expected from one of his 
temperament, Guy’s opinions of his con- 
temporaries are not always borne out by the 
facts we know concerning them. As an 
instance of this may be cited his violently 
unjust criticism of Julian Le Paulmier, one 
of the best known physicians of his time. 
Le Paulmier or Palmerius (1520-1588) re- 
ceived the degree of Doctor of Medicine at 
Paris in 1556, served four years as a physi- 
cian to the Hétel-Dieu, and was the student 
and friend of Fernel who bequeathed him 
his books and manuscript writings. Patin 
says he served Fernel as his “valet” for 
twelve years and that in recompense Fernel 
had him given the degree of doctor. In 1569 
Le Paulmier published a book “Traité de Ia 
nature et curation des playes de pistolle, 
harquebuse et autres bastons a feu, en- 
semble les remédes des combustions et 
brileurs extrémes et superficiels,” in which, 
while agreeing with Pare in many of his 


| 212 


views, he differed in others and even brought 
the charge that the great mortality among 
the wounded at the siege of Orléans and at 
the battles of Dreux and St. Denis was due 
to the methods of treatment employed by 
Paré and the other surgeons, thereby pro- 
voking a response from Pare. Although a 
Huguenot, Le Paulmier was physician to 
Charles rx and to Henri 11 and held by 
them in high esteem, as also by many of 
the great nobles of the court. He published 
two treatises on the medicinal use of wine 
and cider, and a number of consultations of 
his master, Fernel. In a letter to Spon in 
April, 1643, Patin calls Le Paulmier a wily 
Norman, adding that a Norman by race 
and a physician by profession possesses 
two powerful degrees to become a charlatan, 
and that he had bragged that Fernel had 
bequeathed him some very powerful secrets. 
He also accuses Le Paulmier of having, at a 
time when cider was not familiar as a bever- 
age at Paris, brought up a quantity from 
Normandy and havimg put a little senna in 
it, sold it at a great price, as a wonderful 
secret remedy, thereby makmg a large 
fortune. Patin’s hostility was possibly due 
to the great esteem in which he held Fernel 
and to a sort of jealousy of one who should 


‘{ 213 F 

have the right to be considered a favored 
disciple. Pierre Le Paulmier, Julian’s nephew, 
published, mm 1609, a book “Lapis philoso- 
phicus dogmaticorum,” m which he advo- 
cated the doctrines and medicines of Para- 
celsus and the chemical school, at that 
time most vehemently combated by the 
Faculté de Médecine, for which he was 
suspended by his colleagues. Patin records 
somewhat vauntingly that “he continued 
in his chemistry, which suffocated him, 
having been surprised by an apoplexy 
near a furnace in the year 1610.’ Pierre Le 
Paulmier in turn left his papers to Théodore 
Turquet de Mayerne (1573-1655), the famous 
‘chemical doctor”? whose practices brought 
him under the ban of the Faculté de Méde- 
cine to such an extent that he was obliged to 
leave France and settle in London, where he 
became physician to James 1, and after 
him to Charles 1 and Charles 1, and 
achieved great fame and practice. Mayerne 
published at Geneva a _ book entitled 
“Enchiridion chirurgico praticum,”’ which 
Patin says was undoubtedly composed from 
the papers Fernel had left Le Paulmier, 
which the latter bequeathed to his nephew, 
and he m turn to Mayerne. 


{214} 
It will be recalled that Mayerne, Guénault 
and others persisted m prescribing antimony 
after it was decreed by the Faculté de 
Médecine to be a poison and that the decrees 
of the Faculté had been solemnly authorized 
by the Parlement of Paris in 1566 and in 1615. 
No words suffice to express Patin’s 
detestation of Bourdelot (1610-1685), phy- 
sician to Louis xu and the Prince of Condé. 
Patin had been summoned to Sweden to act 
as physician to the notorious Queen Chris- 
tina. He declined and Bourdelot went m 
his stead. Bourdelot is accused of encourag- 
ing the Queen in her vicious habits. Patin 
dwells especially on his avarice. 


He disregards and always will disregard 
the Sunday Sermon to secure a quantity of 
gold.® He lies nearly as much as he talks, and 
when he can he deceives the sick also. He brags 
here in good company that he was the discoverer 
of the circulation of blood, and that his col- 
leagues do all in their power to deprive him of 
the credit. He is a deep-dyed flatterer, grand 
servant of the apothecaries, and with all his 
fanciful bragging, a horrible liar.® 


Patin adds that he had been apprentice 
to an apothecary and educated in his 


5Letter to Spon, March 2, 1643. 
6Letter to Spon, January 8, 1650. 


| 215 f 

father’s barber shop. Bourdelot’s real name 
was Pierre Michon but he assumed the name 
of his uncle, Edmund Bourdelot, physician 
to Louis x11. Mazarin bestowed an abbey 
on him. Patin’s bad opinion of him seems 
borne out by contemporary evidence al- 
though the language in which he expresses 
it is hardly seemly. 

Patin’s hatred of the Chartier family 
(three members of which were physicians, 
René, the father, and his two sons, Jean and 
Philippe) was intense. Jean Chartier, as 
told above, had been guilty of writing a 
book in favor of the use of antimony, and 
worse than that he had won in his legal 
action against Patin for reinstatement in 
the Faculté de Médecine. René Chartier 
was a very erudite man who devoted his 
life to the publication, in Greek and Latin, 
of a very commendable edition of the works 
of Hippocrates. When René died in great 
poverty Patin wrote to Spon (April 21, 
1655) with exultation over his misfortunes, 
that “the widow is in desperate straits and 
Jean is living on the charity of the Bishop 
of Coutances.”, He was unable to pick any 
serious defects in Chartier’s ‘‘ Hippocrates”’ 
so he descended to a supercilious remark - 
that it should contain a table of contents. 


‘| 216 | 


Guy’s heart was never touched by compas- 
sion when his opponents suffered. Such 
misfortunes only seem to have added bit- 
terness to his angry contempt for them. 

A typical instance of Patin’s attitude 
towards members of his profession whom he 
disliked, or rather hated, for it was not his 
wont to water his wine in such matters, is 
to be found in a letter he wrote Falconet 
(March 23, 1663), concerning a book written 
by Charles Bouvard (1572-1658). The latter 
was a brother-in-law of Riolan, fils, and 
had been physician to Louis x11. He claimed 
that it was by following his advice and 
drinking the waters of Forges, that the long 
years of sterility of Anne of Austria were 
terminated, and that she gave birth to 
Louis xiv and his brother. 

When a very old man he set himself to 
write a book for the reformation of medicine. 
The book was entitled, ‘‘ Historiae hodiernae 
medicinae rationali veritatis ad rationales 
medicos,’ and was published in a very 
small edition at Paris about 1655. Patin 
wrote of it to Falconet on several occasions, 
telling him that Bouvard had shown advance 
copies to only three persons, Riolan, Moreau 
and himself. Patin thought very poorly of it. 
He says that though Bouvard was at one 


| 217 
time an excellent man he was now senile, 
and that his life at the Court had corrupted 
him. He calls him elsewhere a devout 
humbug, who would rather go to church 
twice than once. Patin writing some eight 
years after the publication of the book said 
that Bouvard was told by Riolan that he 
had better suppress the book as it contained 
matter which would anger Cardinal Mazarin 
and his two favorite physicians, Vautier and 
Valot. Bouvard accordingly withdrew from 
circulation the books that had been printed, 
Moreau and Patin both returning the copies 
he had submitted to them. 


I know that he had talked to the Iate King 
(Louis x111) of the merit and capacity of some of 
the doctors through whose hands the King had 
passed, until finally the King exclaimed, “‘ Hélas, 
how unfortunate I am to have passed through 
the hands of so many charlatans!’ These 
messieurs were Héroard, Guillemeau and Vau- 
tier. The first was a good courtier but a bad and 
ignorant physician. M. Sanche, the father told 
me in the past year that he was never a physi- 
cian of Montpellier. The second was a wily 
courtier, who greatly desired to make a fortune, 
but the misfortunes of the Queen Mother, from 
whom he had hoped to receive it, carried him 
away, and the demon character of the Cardinal 
was stronger than his. So much so that he 


‘| 218 


succumbed, and whatever effort he has made 
since, he has not been able to recover, although 
he has moved heaven and earth, and the late 
Prince of Condé himself spoke for him, even 
to Cardinal Richelieu himself, as well as to 
the Iate King and the Queen Mother. He had 
some good qualities, he also had evil ones. I 
associated with him twenty-seven years. We 
graduated at the same time. I knew well how 
he behaved. M. Baralis and I were his phy- 
sicians until his death. Finally, I knew that 
in his practice there was much of hypocrisy 
and finesse; but also there was good doctrine 
and virtue, that is to say, of mixed merchan- 
dise. Vautier was an ignorant Jew of Avignon, 
very boastful and uneducated. He was fortunate 
not to have been hung, and he would infallibly 
have been so, if the poor Queen had lived six 
months longer. He had made counterfeit money, 
and subsequently found means to ensconce 
himself at Court. The disgrace of the Queen 
Mother gave him the entrée at Blois by the 
credit of Madame de Guercheville. He bragged 
that he possessed chemical secrets. . . . The 
Marillacs used him in their conspiracy against 
Cardinal Richelieu. The Day of Dupes’ came. 


7 Journée des Dupes, November 11, 1630, thus 
called because on that date the Queen Mother and 
Richelieu caused the downfall of the conspirators 
who had been duped into believing that they were 
strong enough to overthrow them. 





FRANCOIS GUENAULT 
(15— —1667) 


THE LIBRARY | 
OF THE 
CHIVERSITY OF TLLINGIS 





[219 f 

The Cardinal arrested the Marillacs and they 
were lost. Vautier was arrested and imprisoned 
in the Bastille for nearly twelve years. At length 
the scene and theater of the Court being 
changed, he became premier médecin du rot, by 
means of 20,000 écus which he gave to Cardinal 
Mazarin, who took from all hands, on condition, 
so they said, that he should be his spy. That is 
politics! He had been the father’s prisoner for 
twelve years and they trusted him with the 
health of the son. 


Another person who was most antipathe- 
tic to Patin was Francois Guénault, physi- 
cian to Louis x11, his wife, Anne of Austria, 
the Prince of Condé and many of the great- 
est personages of his time. He had probably 
the largest and most fashionable practice 
of any of the physicians of Paris, but he was 
a confirmed advocate of the use of anti- 
mony. He figures as Macroton, with the 
three other court physicians in Moliére’s 
“T’amour médecin.” He was accused of 
bemg avaricious and unscrupulous. Patin 
writes of him that he was said to have 
stated “that one would not be able to 
extract the white crowns (écus_ blancs) 
from patients unless one deceived them.” 
He elsewhere terms him “‘un grand empois- 
onneur chymique.” Patin’s hate poisoned 


“| 220 [| 


his mind to such an extent that when 
Guénault’s daughter died in childbirth, her 
father having administered antimony to 
her during her illness, Patin actually writes: 
“Guénault is a madman. By wickedness 
(méchanceté) he has poisoned his daughter.” 

Although a good friend of Patin’s, Lamoig- 
non did not employ him as his physician 
but had Guénault in that capacity. Patin 
writes Falconet (May 10, 1661) that he has 
been unable to secure an interview with the 
premier president for a townsman of Fal- 
conet’s, because Lamoignon is ill: 


He is in the hands of Sieur Guénault, who has 
retarded his recovery in place of hastening it, 
having purged him too soon, which obliged them 
to have recourse to bleeding many times. They 
have begun now to purge him but he has a 
severe headache which prevents one talking of 
any business to him. I have promised your 
friend that when he has recovered I will go and 
see him, and sometime I will try to obtain some- 
thing for him. Do not be astonished that I am 
not his physician, Guénault has been so for 
more than twenty-six years, for political reasons. 


When Guénault died, Patin wrote Fal- 
conet (May 17, 1667) : 


Today, in the morning, the 16th of May, M. 
Guénault died at St. Germain of an apoplexy 


‘| 221 


God did not permit that he should be saved by 
vin émétique, he, who in former times, has killed 
sO many persons with this poison and with the 
laudanum chymisticunt. 


On Van Helmont the judgment passed by 
Patin in a letter to Spon (April 7, 1645) was: 


He was a wicked, Flemish rascal, who died 
insane a few months ago. He never did any- 
thing of value. I have seen everything he wrote. 
This man only thought of one method of prac- 
tice, made up of chemical and empirical secrets. 
He wrote much against bloodletting, for the lack 
of which, however, he died in a frenzy. 


In recent times the contributions of 
Van Helmont to medicine, especially to 
chemistry, rank much higher than those of 
Guy, or any of his contemporaries of 
the Faculté de Médecine of Paris. His 
investigations first directed attention to 
the fact that many of the processes of the 
living body were chemical and Ied to the 
chemistry of vital processes, and he dis- 
covered the chemical existence of gases, and 
their different natures, such as flammable 
and non-inflammable, noxious and mnox- 
ious, thereby opening up an entirely new 
field of chemical research. 

Van Helmont, who was born in 1577 and 
died in 1644, was before Franciscus de le 


«| 222 


Boé (1614-1672) the chief contemporary 
representative of the tatrochemical school, 
the founder of which was Paracelsus, con- 
sequently he was the living embodiment of 
evil to Patin’s mind. Van Helmont’s mystical 
theories of an archaeus, or governing princi- 
ple of animal life, with a special archaeus 
presiding over each region or organ of the 
body made no appeal to Patin’s materialis- 
tic mind, and he very rightly had no 
patience with the sympathetic omtment or 
powder, in support of which Van Helmont 
wrote a treatise. This sympathetic oint- 
ment, or weapon salve, was one of the most 
curious delusions which has ever prevailed 
in the medical profession. Briefly, it con- 
sisted in the belief that wounds could be 
healed by dippmg something, preferably 
the weapon with which the injury had been 
inflicted, in the blood or discharges from 
the wound, and then dressing this object 
with the ointment or salve, applymg band- 
ages to it while leaving the wound itself 
undressed. In other words it was a form of 
“absent treatment.” These ointments were 
variously compounded. Paracelsus, to whom 
is usually ascribed the start of the idea, 
especially recommended one composed of 
moss from a human skull, human fat and 


{ 223 } 

blood, mummy, oil of roses, bole armeniac, 
and linseed oil. Sir Kenelm Digby manufac- 
tured his sympathetic powder from a mix- 
ture of copper sulphate and other chemicals. 
When Patin hated once it was for good and 
all, and nothing which Van Helmont might 
do that was of worth could atone for his 
mysticism and chemistry. In justice to 
Patin it should be noted that most of Van 
Helmont’s chemistry was but a dim fore- 
shadowing of the discoveries of later days 
and it was so hidden in the jargon of 
mysticism in his writings that its signifi- 
cance is hard to find nowadays and must 
have been doubly so to his contemporaries. 

Of the famous chemist Oswald Crollius, 
Patin in a Ietter to Charles Spon (February 
20, 1654) wrote: 


I believe this man was never a physician, 
sage, or philosopher. He was a peculiar char- 
acter, melancholy and ambitious, who, dis- 
contented with the ordinary science of the 
schools, wished to tnvent some other more 
certain. But he sought to fly without wings. 
. . . I have before heard the goodman Fram- 
boisiére say that a German who knew Crollius 
had told him that this man was imbued with 
the desire to make two systems of science, 
one of theology, the other of medicine, without 


| 224 

any other authority than that of the Bible, 
and that he was usually hidden in a barn among 
charcoal and furnaces, under pretence of mak- 
ing chemical remedies, but that he was under 
suspicion of making there the false silver money, 
which is current In some parts of Germany. 
Is not that a fine occupation for a reformer of 
the sciences. 


Guy de Ia Brosse, who was physician 
in ordinary to Louis x11, was a skilful and 
learned man who founded the Jardin des 
Plantes, procuring patent letters for its 
establishment and being named its mtend- 
ant in 1626. Patin wrote describing his 
last illness, m a letter to Belin (September 
4, 1641): ““He had a flux of the belly from 
eating too many melons and drinking too 
much wine. As to the last, it was not as 
much his fault as his custom.” Patin tells 
how Ia Brosse took emetics, astringents 
and eau-de-vie but when bleeding was 
spoken of he said: “It was the remedy of 
sanguinary pedants and that he would 
rather die than be bled.” “The devil will 
bleed him in the other world, as merits 
a rascal, an atheist, an impostor, a homicide, 
and a public executioner such as he was.” 

Triaire thinks possibly Guy’s enmity was 
due to the fact that in founding the Jardin 


| 225 | 
des Plantes this erudite naturalist took from 
the Faculté the privilege of teaching a 
very Important branch of medicine. 

Elie Beda des Fougerais, premier médecin 
to Louis xiv, who figures as Desfonandrés in 
Moliére’s “‘L’ amour médecin,” was, accord- 
ing to Patin,® not to be classed with honest 
men: 


He is a chemist, an empiric, and gains all he 
can by effrontery and impudence, without sea- 
soning his actions with any prudence. He 
promises to cure everybody. He makes crazy 
statements of what he can do and of knowing 
more than anyone else; that such and such an 
one knows only how to bleed and purge, but 
that he possesses great secrets. . . . He was 
formerly a great giver of antimony but he did 
such poor business that he gave itup. . . . I 
do not like to talk nor think evil, but it is not 
through mischief that I speak thus of him, but 
in pure truth that you may know and recognize 
that this personage is a valet to the apothe- 
caries and a grand cajoler of pretty women. 


Patin writes of Beda’s (the man’s real 
name was Elie Beda, he added the des 
Fougerais of his own will) conversion to 
Catholicism to Spon (May 8, 1648) that it 
had “‘pleased God to touch the heart (I do 


8 Letter to Spon, August, 1650. 


«| 226 


not say the soul because I doubt if he has 
one), of our master Elie Beda . . . He 
goes henceforth to mass, carries a chaplet, 
and acts the bigot, as the others.” 

On Joseph Duchesne (1521-1609) more 
generally known by his Latinized name 
Quercetanus, Patin pours forth the follow- 
ing diatribe in a letter to Spon (January 
8, 1650). Quercetanus had been physician 
in ordinary to Henri tv and was an ardent 
follower of Paracelsus and an antimonialist: 


The same year there died here a wicked 
rogue of a charlatan, who killed many during 
his life, and also after his death by the miserable 
writings which he left under his name which he 
had caused to be made by other physicians and 
chemists from here and there. 

It was Josephus Quercetanus, who called him- 
self at Paris the Sieur de la Violette. He was a 
great quack, a heavy drunkard, and one plainly 
ignorant, who knew nothing of Latin, whose 
first trade was that of surgeon’s apprentice in 
Armagnac, which is a poor country. He passed 
at Paris, and chiefly at the Court, as a first-class 
physician, because he had learned something of 
chemistry in Germany. 


Patin’s hatred of the Arabic school of 
Medicine is fully explained in a letter to 
Spon (May 29, 1648) in which he writes that 


‘| 227 | 
all that is good in their doctrine came from 
the Greeks. As to their remedies the school 
flourished at a time when they were in 
possession of better remedies than those 
known to Hippocrates but the Arabs made 
bad use of them. 


The miserable Arabesque pharmacy was 
introduced and the rascally hot remedies, use- 
less and superfluous, which are today in too 
much credit all over the world, and by a 
quantity of which the sick are villainously 
deceived. What good are all these compositions, 
all these sugared and honeyed alteratives, 
against which the wisest men in Europe have 
declared and raised themselves for a hundred 
years, aS against an insupportable tyranny? 

. The great abuse of medicine is due to the 
multiplicity of useless remedies and the neglect 
of bloodletting. The Arabs are the cause of 
both. . . . We save more sick people with a 
good lancet and a pound of senna, than the 
Arabians can with all their syrups and opiates. 
We would do very wrong to quit the good 
remedies, which have come into use from the 
time of Hippocrates, for those which are less 
good or unknown to us. The method does not 
comprehend the remedy but the law and manner 
of using it rightly. It is the doctrine of tndica- 
tions which shows a physician as he really 
is, and for this we owe our entire obligation to 


‘| 228 


the Greeks, who if they knew not senna and 
cassia It was not their fault, but their misfor- 
tune. Also it was not by the Arabs that senna 
was discovered and made known to us, it was 
in use before them. Strong and violent remedies 
are yet good for some, but the science and 
method of the Greeks teach us to use most 
successfully the benign and to keep away from 
those capable of harm, if we have not great need 
of them. 


There is a brutality in Patin’s references 
to those whom he hated, which ts either a 
childish affectation or else an indecency. He 
writes to Spon (March 8, 1644) as follows: 


M. Merlet, eight days before the death of 
M. Richer, made a false step in mounting (his 
mule or horse) by which he thought he had 
broken his leg, but he only had a slight disloca- 
tion of the péroné (ankle). The wags say that 
he would have done better if he had broken his 
neck. That will be for another time when it will 
please God to deliver our school of this terrible 
fool. 


MOLIERE AND PATIN 


Guy’s great therapeutic standbys were 
purgation, with senna or manna, enemas, 
and venesection. Some of his letters remind 
one forcibly of the chorus of the bachelors 


‘[ 229 | 
of medicine in “Le malade imaginaire” 


of Moliére: » 


Clysterium donare, 
Postea saignare, 
Ensuitta purgare. 


A maxim of Patin’s was ‘Marcher la 
saignée devant la purge.” 

Probably the ideas of most readers of 
the present concerning the medical pro- 
fession in France during the seventeenth 
century are derived from Moliére, wherefore 
it is well that we should stop for a moment 
to consider somewhat his attacks on them. 

Three of his comedies are especially 
virulent in their attacks on the profession, 
“L’amour médecin,” “Le médecin malgré 
lur’ and “Le malade imaginarre.” In 
“L’amour médecin” he caricatures a con- 
sultation between four of the King’s physi- 
cians, Daquin or Valot under the name of 
Tomés, Elie Beda des Fougerais as Des- 
fonandrés, Guénault as Macroton, and 
Esprit as Bahis, in such a way that his 
audiences, largely composed of courtiers 
must have hugely appreciated the joke, and 
readily recognized the originals under the 
scanty disguise. 

It is said that Boileau suggested to Moliére 
the names under which certain well-known 


{ 230 

characteristics of the physicians were re- 
vealed. Thus, Desfonandrés means “slayer 
of men’; Bahis mdicated one who stam- 
mered; Macroton, a slow talker, as Guénault 
was known to be; Tomés, a bleeder, was 
applicable to Daquin, who was famous for 
his propensities in that direction. Elsewhere 
I have given Patin’s own expressions 
concerning Guénault and des Fougerais. 
No ridicule which Moliére could throw at 
them could equal the contempt which Patin, 
their colleague, heaped upon them. Patin 
writes to Falconet (September 22, 1665): 


They performed a short time ago at Ver- 
sailles a comedy about the physicians of the 
Court, in which they were treated with ridicule 
before the King who laughed at it very much. 
They put in the chief place the first five physi- 
cians, and above all our master, Elie Beda, 
otherwise the Sieur des Fougerais, who Is a man 
of great probity and very worthy of praise, if 
one believes that of which he would persuade us. 


A few days later, September 25, 1665, 
Patin refers again to the performance of 
““L’amour médecin.” ““They are now per- 
forming at the Hotel de Bourgogne, 
‘L’amour médecin.” AII Paris crowds there 
to see represented the physicians of the 
Court, chiefly Esprit and Guénault, with 


| 231 F 
masks especially made. They mock those 
who kill people with impunity.” 

Patin does not state that he himself saw 
the play. He writes to Falconet (March 29, 
1669) that all Paris is going to see ‘“T'artufe.” 
Reveillé-Parise thinks that the austerity of 
the manners of physicians rendered it cus- 
tomary for them not to go to the theater. 

There is no doubt that the members of 
the Faculté de Médecine of Paris in the 
seventeenth century laid themselves open 
to the shafts of ridicule. It was a close 
corporation holding tenaciously to ancient 
privileges, admitting to its membership 
only a chosen few each year and those 
chiefly drawn from the ranks of relatives 
and friends of those already members. 
In its very reaction against the poor tradi- 
tion of Arabic medicine, the relic of medie- 
val barbarism, towards the pure Greek 
tradition, it did not escape from slavish 
subservience to the latter, and at a time 
when many were escaping from dogmatic 
adherence to ancient forms and rebelling 
against submission to authority simply 
because it was ancient, the Faculté tried 
in vain to stem the current. Moliére 
combated hypocrisy and affectation wher- 
ever he found them and these two vices 


| 232 | 

were preeminently displayed by members 
of the Faculté. Moliére’s health was poor 
and he had to have recourse frequently to 
medical aid during the later years of his 
life. He had as his physician Mauvilain, 
whom he seems to have respected, and for 
whose son he besought the only favor he 
is known to have asked of the King, an 
ecclesiastical preferment. It is true that 
when Louis x1v asked him how he and 
Mauvilain got along with one another, he 
replied: “‘Sire, we talk together; he pre- 
scribes remedies for me; I do not take 
them; and I recover.”’ Probably his fre- 
quent intercourse with physicians and their 
mability to cure him caused his satirical 
ridicule of them in his plays. He died from 
a pulmonary hemorrhage and most prob- 
ably had tuberculosis for many years before 
his death. Moliére’s only reference to Patin 
is somewhat indirect. During the consul- 
tation in “L’ amour médecin” the doctors, 
not talking at all about the patient whom 
they have been called to see, discuss the 
quarrel between Théophraste and Artémius, 
the latter undoubtedly being Patin, and the 
other his opponent Renaudot. 

Patin certainly read if he did not witness 
the comedies of Moliére. In a letter to 


| 233 | 

Falconet (August 28, 1669) he uses the 
name Tartufe as synonymous with hypo- 
crite. A physician named Cresse became 
involved in a scandal with the wife of a 
barber and Patin, writing to Falconet in 1669, 
in several letters says that it is reported 
Moliére will write a comedy about the 
affair, but the great dramatist never did. 

In many of his comedies besides the three 
mentioned above Moliére indulges in sly 
hits at the medical profession. It is possible 
his ridicule did some good but there was 
no apparent great reformation in French 
medicine until shortly after the Revolution 
when there arose the great school repre- 
sented by such names as Bichat, Laénnec, 
Trousseau, Louis, Dupuytren, Desault, Lar- 
rey, etc., which during the first part of the 
eighteenth century gave to their country 
the foremost position in medical science in 
the world.°® 

Patin was not a frequenter of the “theater- 
ballet”? at the court, and he makes no men- 
tion of his ever having gone to see a play 
or having read one himself. The theater- 


9Brander Matthews in Appleton’s Magazine, 
August 8, 1874, and in Scribner’s Magazine, January, 
1910, has written most entertainingly of Moliére 
and the medical profession. 


| 234 F 

going population at Paris was largely con- 
fined to the nobility or to the frequenters of 
fairs. Mauvilain, Moliére’s physician, was 
a classmate of Robert Patin’s. Guy Patin 
refers to him occasionally m his lists of 
evildoers who gave antimony, and whom 
he accused of being avaricious for fees. 

Patin only mentions Corneille once when, 
in a letter to Falconet (October 21, 1643), 
he tells him: “‘M. Corneille, the illus- 
trious maker of comedies, is going to write 
an answer to Pellisson’s ‘Histoire de 
’ Academie.’ ”’ 

Patin knew La Fontaine, the author of 
the celebrated fables. He writes Charles 
Spon in August, 1658, that he had shown 
La Fontaine a letter that Spon had written, 
and that La Fontaine had asked him to 
send him his good wishes. 


BLOODLETTING 


Patin’s letters are full of references to 
the beneficent effects obtamed by copious 
bloodletting, applied to diseases of the most 
infinite variety. A few extracts will suffice 
to illustrate his views. He writes to Spon, 
April, 1645, thus: 

There is no remedy in the world which works 
as many miracles as bleeding. Our Parisians 


| 235 | 
ordinarily take little exercise, drink and eat 
much, and become very plethoric. In this condi- 
tion they are hardly ever relieved of whatever 
sickness befalls them if bloodletting does not 
proceed powerfully and copiously, nevertheless 
if the sickness is acute one does not see the 
effect as soon as from purgation. About the year 
1633, M. Cousinot, who is today first physician 
to the King, was attacked by a rude and violent 
rheumatism, for which he was bled sixty-four 
times in eight months, by order of his father, 
and of M. Bouvard, his father-in-law. After 
having been bled so many times they com- 
menced to purge him, by which he was much 
relieved, and in the end recovered. The idiots 
who do not understand our profession imagine 
that there is nothing to do but to purge, but 
they deceive themselves because if bleeding 
copiously had not preceded it, to repress the 
Impetuosity of the vagabond humor, to empty 
the great vessels, and to chastise the intemper- 
ance of the liver which produced the serum, the 
purgation would have been useless. Another 
time I treated in this city a young gentleman of 
seven years, who fell into a pleurisy by over- 
heating himself when playimg tennis, having also 
received in the game a stroke on the foot on the 
right side, which provoked the most grand 
fluxion. His tutor hated bloodletting very 
much and I could only oppose to this hatred a 
good counsel, which was to call two of our 


‘| 236 | 
ancients, M. Seguin and M. Cousinot. He was bled 


thirteen times and was cured in fifteen days, as if 
by a miracle, even the tutor was converted by it, 


In the same letter he writes: 


It is perfectly true that bleeding is a very 
powerful remedy in smallpox, especially if done | 
early, but this disease is sometimes so insidious, 
and the lungs sometimes so involved that it is 
folly to promise relief from it. That is why 
prognosis Is in this case so useful to the physi- 
cian. It is my custom to say to mothers who 
generally have a great concern for the faces of 
their children, that it is necessary first to be 
assured of their life, and that I cannot answer 
for the outcome of this dangerous disease 
until after I have seen the children out in the 
street many times playing with other children. 


Patin considered bleeding as the only 
therapeutic measure of any avail in apoplexy. 
He writes to Falconet (May 10, 1661): “This 
afternoon I gave a very good lecture in 
which I amply explained apoplexy, and 
belabored the apothecaries who would 
exhaust their shops on this malady, but in 
vain. We only cure it by prompt bleedings.” 

Patin again writes to Falconet (October 
14, 1664) his views regarding the treatment 
of epilepsy. He begins by declaring his 
belief that there was no specific for It: 


| 237 | 


I believe that there are no anti-epileptic 
remedies. M. Seguin, Riolan, de la Vigne, and 
Moreau, are of the same opinion. Those 
which Crollius and the race of chemists vaunt 
as such, are fictions or fables. I do not except 
mistletoe, the foot of the eland, the root 
of peony, nor other similar bagatelles. The 
cure of such a great disease depends on an 
exact regimen of life, with abstinence from 
women, wine, and all hot and vaporous foods; 
but bleeding and frequent purgation are neces- 
sary. These do not hurt the brain, and are not 
made with pills or powders. It is necessary, 
sometimes also to evacuate the pus which is in 
the mesentery, the lungs, the hollow part of the 
liver, or the uterus, and the fits will not cease 
until such humor is evacuated. Fernel was 
a great man who broke the ice on many points, 
but he lived too short a time to know and tell 
all. He only lived fifty-two years. Pearls are of 
no use in it (epilepsy) except to enrich the 
apothecary. 


Speaking of the desperate illness of M. 
Merlet, Patin tells Belin: “‘M. Merlet has 
been nearly at the gate, but he has not 
passed through the wicket.” It is wonderful 
that he escaped because Patin tells us that 
he was extremely sick “of an inflammation of 
the lungs for which he was bled sixteen times 
in January. Ina previous month, July, he was 


238 | 
bled eighteen times for a malignant fever. 
Merlet was at that time sixty-six years old.” 

Patin was a “Brissotin,” or disciple of 
Pierre Brissot (1478-1522) as one would 
naturally expect. Brissot brought nto vogue 
“derivative” bleeding, that is bleeding 
from the side of the body on which the 
lesion was located, as taught by Hippoc- 
rates. To this was opposed the Arabian 
theory of “‘revulsive” bleeding, or drawing 
blood from the opposite side to that of the 
lesion. In support of this he writes to Belin, 
fils (March 14, 1649) after his father had had 
a paralytic stroke, urging that he should 
bleed him from the unparalyzed arm, or 
possibly a little Iater from the palsied one. 
Brissot’s theory was applied especially to 
bleeding in cases of pleurisy. 

For the benefit of the lay reader it should 
be stated that m paralysis due to an 
apoplectic stroke or hemorrhage in the brain 
the paralysis occurs on the opposite side of 
the body. 

Brissot’s teaching at a time when the 
Arabian school was at the height of its 
power raised such a storm that he was 
banished from France by the Parlement 
of Paris. The echoes of the controversy 
still lingered in Patin’s time. 


CHAPTER IX 


PaTIN’s LATER YEARS 


SURGEONS AND BARBER-SURGEONS 


To the barber-surgeons, Patin was more 
lenient than to the apothecaries because the 
barbers were more humble in their attitude 
toward the physicians. Patin writes to 
Belin (January 14, 1651): 


As for the barber-surgeons, they are only 
received with our approbation and after exami- 
nation in our presence, and they are only per- 
mitted to practice surgery, not at all pharmacy, 
above all not to administer any purgative or 
narcotic except on the prescription of a 
physician. 

“When each follows his métier, the cows are 
better watched.” We have here very subservient 
(souple) surgeons. Bleeding makes them rich, 
but they know very well that they are in our 
hands and their gains also. They cannot admit 
candidates to their society (Ils ne font point 
d’actes) unless the dean of our Faculté is present, 
accompanied by two doctors who have the right 
to impose silence when they are extravagant in 
their questions, these three even have to sign 


[ 239 | 


‘| 240 | 
the act of reception (of the candidate) otherwise 
he has not the right to open his shop. For the 
rest they love us as their patrons, they see how 
we have treated the apothecaries, and how we 
have nearly annihilated them, and that it 
would not be difficult for us to do the same 
thing to the surgeons, if they were not souple 
and did not rule themselves wisely towards us. 


To Spon he writes (April 21, 1665): 


I assure you that at Paris we hate the sur- 
geons as much and perhaps more than the 
apothecaries, seeing that they are equally 
insolent, added to which they are companions 
of the country of adieusias, who promise mar- 
vels to poor people quos impura Venus ut 
plurimum momordit. 


The history of the Jong quarrel between 
the physicians and surgeons of France has 
been accurately and thoroughly discussed 
by Malgaigne in the introduction to his 
edition of the works of Ambroise Paré. 

In Patin’s time there existed three 
classes of those who practiced the healing 
art; the physicians, the surgeons, and the 
barber-surgeons. The physicians, repre- 
sented by the Faculté de Médecine, had 
formerly had control over both the surgeons, 
whose organization was known as the 


| 241 F 
Collége de Saint Céme, and the barbers 
who belonged to the society of the barber- 
surgeons. 

In 1657 the barber-surgeons decided to 
amalgamate with the Surgeons of Saint 
Céme, frequently called surgeons of the 
long robe, because they wore a long robe 
similar to that m vogue with the physicians 
of the Faculté. This would have the effect 
of removing the barber-surgeons from the 
control of the Faculté and would strengthen 
the hands of the surgeons im their fre- 
quent contests with the latter. The surgeons 
had for centuries been ground between 
two millstones, the Faculté, which would 
not permit them to prescribe and regarded 
them simply as mechanical assistants to 
be called In when they were needed, and 
the barber-surgeons who were constantly 
trespassing on the surgeons’ field and had 
for many centuries done much more and 
better surgical work than the surgeons of 
the long robe. The latter treated abscesses 
and wounds by the application of plasters 
and ointments, but most of the operative 
work was done by the barber-surgeons, 
from whose ranks the incisors, bone-setters, 
and lithotomists were drawn. Thus Franco, 
the Colots, and Paré himself were barber- 


[242 F 
surgeons, and there is no name of note 
found among the surgeons of Saint Céme 
over a period of some hundreds of years. 
Paré was only admitted to their ranks 
through the exertion of the King’s influence 
after he had become famous, and in the 
face of great opposition on the part of 
many of the members. 

Patin as might be expected was furious 
at the prospect of this union. He writes 
to Spon (July 13, 1657): 


We are now at law with our barber-surgeons 
who wish to unite with the surgeons of Saint 
Come, our ancient enemies. Cosmiani alli 
(those of Saint Céme) are miserable rascals, 
nearly all tooth-pullers and very ignorant, 
who have attached the barber-surgeons to 
their string, by making them share their halls 
and their pretended privileges, among others 
holding their examinations in their hall, wearing 
a Iong black robe and a square bonnet, and they 
demand that we be present at these functions, 
I mean our Dean, who goes there accompanied 
by two doctors. . . . They talk of (giving) 
degrees of bachelors, of licentiates and other such 
ceremonies and vanities, altogether indecent for 
such booted lIackeys. The cause will be plead in a 
month and I believe that all the audacious 
designs of this superb mob will be bridled and 
regulated, and meanwhile our Dean will not 


‘] 243 F 


be present at any of their functions. Are these 
surgeons of Saint Céme not agreeable? They 
had permission from the king about three 
hundred years ago by which they were given 
license to assemble together. They claim from 
this word license that they were permitted to 
make licentiates in surgery, which however they 
have never undertaken to do heretofore. . . . 
And they would make for us, doctors pas latins 
(ignorant of Latin), who would not know even 
how to read or write. We do not attempt to 
prevent them from being surgeons of Saint 
Come, or that the others might unite with 
them, we would only have a company of barber- 
surgeons, as we have had until now, which 
would be dependent on our Faculté, and would 
take every year an oath of fidelity in our schools 
at the hands of our Dean, in magnis comitatis 
Facultatis, and pay us every year a certain sum 
for the rights which we have in their functions. 
But we do not wish robes, bonnets, licenses, nor 
any similar abuses. . . . They are already 
sufficiently vainglorious and stupid without 
furnishing themselves with any such apparatus. 


The union was brought about im spite 
of the Faculté’s opposition, to the great 
benefit of French surgery. 

The legal proceedings were not termI- 
nated until 1660 in which year Patin wrote 
several letters to Falconet expressing his 


| 244 | 

satisfaction with the terms of the settle- 
ment. They were satisfactory to Patin 
because, although the surgeons of Saint 
Céme and the barber-surgeons were united 
in one guild, it was placed under the 
authority and control of the Faculté de 
Médecine. This decree of the court was 
confirmed by another in 1676, four years 
after Patin’s death, wherein it was ordered 
that the officers of the guild should appear 
each year, on the day after the feast of 
Saint Luke at the Ecoles de médecine, to 
take the customary oath, pay a gold écu, 
and present a catalogue of their maitres 
to the deans of the Faculté. This distinction 
between the physicians and surgeons m 
France continued until August 18, 1792, 
when the Assembly abolished all faculties 
and corporations. After the Revolution, 19, 
ventose an xi, the medical schools were 
legally reorganized but the educational 
requirements were the same for the practice 
of either medicine or surgery and only one 
degree, that of M.D., was given to the 
graduates. 


THE APOTHECARIES 


A very famous victory was won by Patin 
in 1647, over those whom hecalled ‘‘mes 


| 245 } 
chers ennemis,” the apothecaries of Paris. 
The apothecaries had sided with Renaudot 
in his memorable attack on the Faculté de 
Medecine because of the condemnation by 
it of the use of antimony and its attitude 
against the Arabian polypharmacy which 
was such a great source of revenue to the 
pharmacists. Patin was especially conspicu- 
ous in the Faculté and both in speech and 
writing lost no opportunity to belabor the 
apothecaries for what he called their swind- 
ling and avariciousness. The new pharma- 
copeeia published by the Faculté de Méde- 
cine was calculated to hurt the apothecaries 
very much as it had a distinct tendency to 
lessen the complexity of compounds and 
to encourage the use of the simpler prepara- 
tions. Patin wrote a thesis “‘Estne longae 
ac jJucundae vitae trita certaque parens 
sobrietas.” This may be briefly summed up 
as “On Sobriety”’ and he caused it to be 
sustained by one of his scholars, Montigay, 
March 14, 1647. In it he poured out a 
long diatribe against the apothecaries, their 
methods and their preparations. The 
apothecaries brought an action in the court 
of the Parlement of Paris against Patin. 
Patin in a letter to Falconet (April ro, 


| 246 | 

1647)! tells how, acting as his own lawyer 
he discoursed for an entire hour, at the 
end of which the Court gave judgment in 
his favor and the apothecaries were driven 
from the hall, amidst the jeering and hoot- 
ing of the audience, which according to 
Patin amounted to six thousand persons. 

His description is so picturesque or 
Patinesque, that I transcribe it in full: 


For my dear enemies, the apothecaries of 
Paris, complained of my last thesis to our Faculté 
which mocked them. They appealed against it 
to the Parlement, where their advocate having 
been heard, I myself responded immediately 
(sur le champ) and having discoursed an entire 
hour to a very large and very favorable audience 
(as I had also done five years ago against the 
Gazetteer), the poor devils were condemned, 
hooted, mocked, and confounded by all the 
court, and by six thousand persons, who 
were ravished to see them refuted and over- 


1 André Falconet (1612-1691) was a native of 
Roanne. He received his doctor’s degree at Mont- 
pellier and practiced medicine at Lyons. He is first 
mentioned by Patin in a letter to Spon, April 21, 
1643, wherein he asks Spon for information about a 
“*M. Falconet who has written on scurvy”’ referring 
to a work by Falconet entitled ‘‘ Moyens préservatif 
pour le guérison du scorbut,”’ published at Lyons in 
1642. 


‘| 247 | 


thrown as I had done. I talked against their 
bezoar, their confection of alkermes, their 
theriac, and their compositions. I made them 
see that organa pharmaciae erant organa pallacae, 
and made them acknowledge it to all my 
auditors. The poor devils of pharmacists were 
put to such confusion that they did not know 
where to hide themselves. AII the city knew it 
and likewise mocked them, so much that honor 
came to me from all sides, the same as from our 
Faculté which rendered me thanks because I 
had so well defended myself from the annoyance 
(pince) of these good men, and in such a way 
that it went to the honor of our company. The 
judges even have praised me. Voila, monsieur, 
[histoire des pbarmaciens. 


Paris really was a hotbed where all 
kinds of charlatanry flourished in Patin’s 
time as Is apt to be the case in any great 
city, and there was much cause for com- 
plaint. He writes to Spon (April 21, 1655): 


There arrive here a thousand misfortunes 
because of the too great credulity of the sick, 
who address themselves to the surgeon’s appren- 
tices, apothecaries, charlatans, operators and 
other ignorant animals eager for gain. Note that 
the greater part of these strollers are Proven- 
cals, Languedociens, and Gascons, or from the 


| 248 F 
neighboring provinces. This only occurs here 
because of the lack of police and negligence of 
our judges. 

Patin was a vehement, not to say ven- 
omous, enemy when aroused, but also a 
very difficult one to combat, because of 
the careful preparations he made for his 
various combats and the skill with which 
he armed himself. Thus he writes to Belin 
(August, 18, 1647) that he is going to prepare 
for a future possible attack by the apothe- 
caries, a work in which he will “‘refute the 
bezoar, the cordial waters, the unicorn’s 
horns, theriac, the confections of hyacinth 
and alkermes, the precious fragments and 
other arabesque bagatelles,” but that it 
will require three or four years of leisure to 
complete the book. In the two speeches 
which he delivered at the Renaudot trial 
and in his own defense against the apothe- 
caries, his audiences were overpowered 
by his display of learning and the scope of 
the arguments with which he supported 
the sharp and witty invectives which he 
Iaunched against his foes. Patin would 
surely have pleased Dr. Johnson as a “‘good 
hater.”’ He certainly had the courage of his 
convictions. Writing to Belin (January 18, 
1633) in speaking of the warfare the physi- 


| 249 
clans were waging against the apothecaries 
because of avarice and extortion, Patin says: 


In the majority of the grand houses there are 
no longer apothecaries, it is a man or a chamber- 
maid who makes and gives the enemas, and the 
medicines also, which we have reduced to the 
laxative juice of prunes, or bouillon and senna 
with juice of citron, or orange, or verjuice, or 
a laxative ptisan of cassia and senna, accord- 
ing to the taste of the patient. 


In a long letter to Spon (June 18, 1649) 
Patin bursts forth against the monks whom 
he hates almost as bitterly as the Jesuits. 
After a long tirade he writes: 


But leave that pest of religion to pass to that 
of medicine, I mean the apothecaries. You 
(the physicians of Troyes) have made an 
agreement with them; they are not worthy to 
enter Into a composition with their masters, 
upon whom they should depend absolutely. If 
you wish to prevent them from undertaking 
anything or trespassing on you it is only 
necessary to make them remember the Médecin 
Charitable, with which, though it only costs a sol 
or two, we have ruined the apothecaries of Paris. 
Make them understand that there are at the 
grocers, cassia, senna, rhubarb, syrup of roses 
and with these remedies we can do without them, 


| 250 | 

and have rendered them so ridiculous, that no 
one wishes to see them at their houses, and so 
they have more leisure than they desire 
to stay in their shops. There is no more, 
thank God, any question of bezoar, or cordial 
waters in smallpox, or julep cordials, or 
pearls, in any disease whatever. The people are 
not decetved by these bagatelles or by any 
others. The rich do not avail themselves of 
them any more and hold themselves under 
obligation to many ancients of our Faculté for 
delivering them from this tyranny. These 
messieurs, our ancients were M. Marescot; 
his son-in-law, Simon Pietre; Jean Duret, 
son of Louis; the two Cousinots; Nicolas 
Pietre; Jean Hautin; M. Bouvard du 
Chemin; Brayer; de Ia Vigne; Merlet; Michel 
Seguin; Baralis; Alam; R. Moreau; Boujonier; 
Charpentier; de Launay; Guillemeau; and many 
others who introduced into the families at Paris 
an easy and familiar medical practice which 
has delivered them from the tyranny of these 
arabesque cooks.?. . . In such sort that the 
apothecaries at present scarcely find them- 
selves in demand except for strangers lodging in 
furnished chambers. 


2 Figaro. Barber of Seville, Act 1, Sc. iv, speaking 
of his functions in the house of Bartholo says he is 
“his barber, his surgeon, his apothecary; there is not 
given in his house a stroke of the razor, the lancet, or 
the piston except by the hand of your servant.” 


| 251 f 

Writing to Spon (March 10, 1648) Patin 
tells him that Guillemeau had written a 
thesis in which he attacked the apothe- 
caries and the Arabian pharmacy but that 
he had not had the courage to print it 
without retrenching many of the strongest 
parts of his arguments. Guy says “‘every- 
body is not equally brave in this country, 
those who think themselves wise here, 
worship the golden calf and revere the for- 
tune of the wicked.”” Some one had said to 
him that “everyone was not as fortunately 
brave as he, and that although what he had 
written was right, nevertheless there was no 
need to say or write it.”” Guy pours out his 
contempt on such cowardice. Nevertheless 
one cannot help the feeling at times, that 
part of his bitterness, especially against 
the physicians who held a great place at 
Court, was sour grapes. 


SIDE LIGHTS ON PATIN’S CLIENTELE 


In a letter to Belin,* he says: “Most of 
the Court physicians are ignorant or char- 
latans, and very often both,” and again, 
“at least you can go and see M. Vautier, 
chief physician to the King, but do not 


3 March 14, 1657. 


| 252 F 

talk to him of me; our dogs do not run 
together. I am not, nor do I wish to be 
an antimonial doctor, for I know too well 
that antimony Is a poison.” Some of those 
whom he judged most harshly, were cer- 
tainly held in great esteem, not only by their 
patients but by many of their professional 
colleagues. Guy is not above letting his 
correspondents know that he has some 
aristocratic patients on his list. Thus he 
concludes a long letter to Spon (May 209, 
1648): “But here is the hour that a coach 
should come to take me, drawn by six good 
horses, to see, at nine leagues from here, 
M. de Marillac, Master of Requests, who 
is sick there with an attack of gout.” 

The Marillacs were very prominent 
people and Patin liked to imform his. 
friends of his professional relations with 
them. He writes to Spon (June 14, 1650) 
that he and the elder Moreau had been 
taken by the wife of M. de Marillac, 
maitre des requétes, “two leagues from here 
to see her sister, a nun, who was sick. . . 
It was beautiful m the country, and very 
comfortable to go there in a coach.” 

In a letter to Belin, fils (June 19, 1649) 
Guy says he is going against his will to 
Fontainbleau to see the son of a trésorier de 


| 253 I 

l extraordinaire des guerres who Is very sick, 
“‘the father and mother take me there in 
their coach.” The physicians of the seven- 
teenth century made their rounds on horse- 
back or riding a mule. There were stone 
steps placed at the école de médecine to 
facilitate their mounting and getting off. 

Pict quotes from Patin’s contemporary 
Vigneul de Marville the following sketch 
of Guy which Is contained in his ‘“Mélanges 
d’histoire et de littérature.”’ 


Guy Patin was satiric from his head to his feet. 
His hat, collar, cloak, his doublet, stockings and 
boots, all bid defiance to the world and went to 
law with vanity. He had in his countenance, 
the air of Cicero and in his esprit, the character 
of Rabelais. His great memory furnished him 
always with subjects for conversation and he 
talked much. He was hardy, bold, incon- 
siderate, simple and naive in his expressions. 


In spite of some repellant characteristics 
Patin seems to have had a large practice 
chiefly among the rich bourgeoisie, the 
officials of the Parlement of Paris, lawyers 
and merchants. His professional standing 
was good with his colleagues in spite of his 
many enmities, because we know that he » 


4 Guy Patin, Paris, 1911, 


| 254 } 
attended many of them, Riolan, Moreau, 
etc., and that he was frequently called in 
consultation by them. 

Patin writes to Charles Spon (January 20, 
1645) of a bequest of three thousand livres 
which he recetved from a patient named 
Jean Baptiste Lambert to whom he had been 
physician for eight years. Lambert had 
acquired a great fortune by participating 
in the financial affairs of the government, 
and Patin hints that he had given him an 
opportunity to join in his devious methods 
of acquiring wealth but adds that he had 
always ‘“‘despised the fortune in which he 
wished me to share.” 

A sidelight on the devious ways by which 
some physicians sought to obtain practice 
in Guy’s time is afforded in a letter written 
by him to Spon (January 7, 1661). The lat- 
ter had referred a patient who was at Paris 
to Patin, but the patient had fallen instead 
into the hands of a physician named 
Lienard. Patin says it was probably through 
the agency of an inn keeper: 


Because he (Lienard) is in relation with all 
the hosts in his quarter and I do not doubt it 
if his inn was in the rue des Trois Mores or 
Aubry-le-Boucher, because I have known this 
fact for a long time . . . God be praised of all, 


| 255 F 
I do not lack patients, nor wish for them. I 
thank you nevertheless for your good affection. 
I ask you only if he is still at Lyons, without 
seeming to do anything, to learn from him the 


name of the street and sign of his inn, because 
I think I have divined it. 


Lienard had evidently insmuated to the 
patient that if he fell m Patin’s hands he 
would be bled to excess, because the patient 
told Spon that he had heard of this failing 
of Patin’s. The latter says this was a cow- 
ardly trick of Lienard’s similar to many 
others that he had done. 

Patin, like other physicians, occasionally 
had patients stray from his fold, and he 
writes to Falconet (January 31, 1659) with 
ill-concealed despite of one such instance: 


As to this Abbé Forcoal, I formerly treated 
him when very ill for several diseases. His 
father said that he wished to witness how much 
he thought of me and that he would give me 
one hundred écus a year to be their physician. 
This he did and I received this for eighteen 
months. The Abbé (who at that time was 
only aumonier du rot) suffered from a painful 
and grievous illness, from which he happily 
recovered and said much in praise of me. 
Much time passed and they did not send for 


| 256 | 
me. I learned that Valot went to see them, 
and gave them powders, waters and pills, and 
that they had given me up because I prescribed 
too few drugs. . . . When I met the father 
in the city he always said he would send for me 
to see them, but he did not do so, so I rested 
there. The father was a miserable native of 
Cevennes, a Huguenot, who came to Paris to 
improve his condition, and make his fortune 
if he could. He was lackey to a secretary of the 
King’s, named Addée, likewise a Huguenot, 
and then became his clerk. Finally, he became 
a great partisan and mixed in many affairs, 
the aides, the gabelle, and others, where he 
would make money. He changed his religion 
to become secretary to the council, and became 
a still greater partisan. Then he married his 
only daughter, who was very beautiful, to a 
son of M. Addée, his former master, who is 
blind and a Huguenot, but she was a Catholic. 
He had many sons, of which he made the 
eldest a captain, the second a maitre des requétes, 
the third aumonier du roi, who is now the Abbé. 

. . Finally Forcoal, the father, died, owing 
five or six millions, with three hundred law- 
suits by those whom he owed... . 

The whole secret of these people 1s while they 
have the upper hand, to take money from all 
sides, and then to go into bankruptcy, not only 
to their creditors but likewise to God, for their 
conscience and their honor. 


| 257 } 

Patin gives a curious Instance of his 
physiological views in the followmg state- 
ment to Falconet (October 26, 1658): 

Inflammation of the lung is always fatal to 
those who have red hair. The late M. de la 
Vigne, one of the physicians of our Faculté was 
very red. I called him one day in consultation on 
a secretary of the king’s named Collier who was 
seventy-five years old, and very redheaded. He 
was ill with an inflammation of the lung, which 
I predicted would be fatal. M. de la Vigne asked 
me where I had learned this prognostic of the 
redheaded? I answered him that I had always 
remarked it as very true besides which I had 
heard it said by M. Nicolas Pietre, who had 
learned it from his brother, the great Simon 
Pietre and the reason was that the redheaded 
abounded in bitter and malign serosity. 

Patin certainly at times lays himself 
open to the reproach that those who live in 
glass houses should not throw stones. He 
retails with relish the foibles and weaknesses 
of his fellowmen, and consequently exposes 
himself to the exposure of his own. Even 
the dead did not escape his malicious pen. 
Thus he writes to Spon (January 20, 1649): 

We have freshly lost one of our companions, a 
resolute and well-intentioned man named M. 
Nic Heliot, aged forty-seven years. He died of 
hydropsy of the lungs, after having languished 


] 258 F 

for two months. He had imvited in his [ast 
will, all the Faculté, as many doctors as possible 
to be present at his interment. To this effect he 
had ordained that each doctor who came there in 
a red robe should have two quarter crowns for 
his presence, and half that to those who came in 
a black robe with the square bonnet. He was 
interred with very great ceremony and pomp, 
accompanied by sixty doctors, of whom there 
were forty in red robes and twenty im black. 
Nevertheless the Faculté decreed that they 
should not take his money, and that the said 
sum of one hundred pounds which would have 
been necessary to carry out his last wishes, 
should be left and returned to his widow. He 
died without children. His brother is an échevin 
of the city of Paris. He was of a good family, 
very rich, but he loved extremely the ceremonies 
and displays that make a noise. God guard from 
harm those who are of an altogether different 
sentiment. For me I am content and much 
desire that they should bury me at four o’clock 
in the morning, or at nine o'clock im the evening, 
and that this manége, which seems only invented 
for the gain of priests and bell ringers, or for the 
solace of the living, fiat et pereat sine sonitu, 
but I hope this may not arrive too soon. 


RICHELIEU AND MAZARIN 


Years after Richelteu’s death Patin con- 
tinued to refer to him with the greatest 


1 259 F 

animosity. Writing to Belin, fils (January 
14, 1651), he speaks of a case in which a 
surgeon had given a narcotic pill containing 
opium to a patient, with a fatal result, and 
adds that possibly it was the same kind of 
pill which was given to the great Cardinal 
shortly before his death, which Patin 
thought had accelerated his end and he 
concludes: “‘Would to God he had given it 
to him twenty years sooner.” Patin never 
admits that any of Richelieu’s great 
policies were actuated by a desire to 
aggrandize France or the King, although 
It Is now conceded that he was a great 
man who, though frequently gratifying 
his personal ambition, nevertheless in the 
main served the interests of his King and 
country. 

His hatred of Richelieu was augmented 
by the fact that the Cardinal had caused 
the execution of de Thou, a great friend of 
Patin’s, for treason in 1644. De Thou was 
the son of the famous French historian. 
The correspondence contains many refer- 
ences to the execution of young de Thou 
years after the event. Writing to Spon 
(September 12, 1664), Patin says: “It ts 
twenty-two years ago that Armand, Car- 
dinal de Richelieu, Ministre enragé had 


‘| 260 


beheaded in your city my good and dear 
friend, M. de Thou.” 

There are many allusions in Patin’s 
correspondence to Richelieu’s atheism, or 
at Teast lack of belief in the fundamental 
doctrines of the Roman Catholic Church. 
Thus Patin wrote to Spon (April 13, 1647) 
the following anecdote: 


The Cardinal Richelieu who loved a joke 
when he was not tormented by his black bile, 
asked one day of Doctor Mulot, his confessor, 
how many masses were necessary to get a soul 
out of purgatory. Doctor Mulot responded that 
the Church had never defined it. The Cardinal 
replied: “‘That is because you are an ignoramus, 
I know very well, it requires as many of them 
as of bullets of snow to heat an oven.” Are 
these not good men, who mock thus the holy 
and sacred fire which makes their marmite 
boil so fortunately? 


Patin writes Spon (November 3, 1649) 
that a courtier had told him that two years 
before his death, Richelieu, notwithstanding 
his ill health and the immensity of his 
labors, had three mistresses; his niece, 
Marie de Vignerot, who is better known as 
the duchesse d’ Aiguillon; Madame de Chaul- 
nes, and the famous Marion Delorme. Of 
the latter Patin adds that she had been 


‘| 261 | 


the mistress of Cing-Mars, and many others 
before Richelieu: ‘She is still held in 
esteem, and has even passed into history 
for her beauty, because Vittorio Siri has 
talked of her in his ‘Mercure.’”’ 

Patin’s hatred of Cardinal Mazarin, the 
inheritor of Richelieu’s power was fully as 
bitter without any particular personal rea- 
son for it. One of his favorite epithets for 
him is “the Pantaloon in a Jong robe”’ or 
“the Pantaloon with a red hat.” Writing to 
Garnier, a physician of Lyons, June 18, 1649, 
he says of Mazarin that it is the “‘ Pantaloon 
in a long robe”’ who “‘is the cause of all our 
ills, and of the ruin of France.” 

He accuses Mazarin of finding in the 
wars into which he plunged France the 
pierre philosophale, and complains many 
times of the devastation and pillage to which 
the country was subjected not only by the 
enemies’ troops but by the irregularities 
committed by the French troops in their 
own country. In a letter to Spon (May 14, 
1649) he complains that his country house 
has been robbed by the soldiers of Mazarin, 
and he raises his voice many times in bitter 
complaints agaist the policies of the 
Cardinal. Although Mazarin’s apologists 
point to the successful results of his di- 


“| 262 


plomacy and show how the wars in which 
he involved France added to her territories 
and increased her prestige, nevertheless 
those who have studied the history of the 
period in which he controlled the destinies 
of the country are struck with his disregard 
for the sufferings of the French people and 
with the selfishness and avarice which 
dominated his actions, and must allow that 
there is much justice in Patin’s allegations. 
Undoubtedly France was never mm appar- 
ently greater position and prosperity than 
during the reign of the Roz Soleil, but 
beneath the surface of all this splendor was 
the misery and woe of the common people, 
paving the way for the events of one 
hundred years later. The arrogance and 
pride of the King of France led to the 
estrangement and hatred of France by 
other countries, and to the numerous wars 
from which France was to suffer throughout 
the eighteenth century and the ruinous 
financial policy which terminated in the 
overthrow of French royalty. 

Patin’s letters written during 1648-49 
when the people of Paris were in revolt 
against the arbitrary government of Maz- 
arin show that he sympathized with the 
people although he took no active part in 


‘| 263 | 

the revolt. He retails with joy every piece 
of news that he picks up which would 
put Mazarin in a disadvantageous light. 
After the King, Queen Mother and the 
Cardinal had re-entered Paris he writes 
Belin, fils, that a printer named Morlet 
had been arrested for printing some scur- 
rilous verses about the Queen Mother and 
Mazarim. It was a matter of current scanda- 
lous rumor that Anne of Austria and 
Mazarin maintained much more intimate 
relations than those which are customary 
between a regent and a chief minister of 
state. Patin says the printer was taken to 
the Chatelet and on the same day con- 
demned to be hanged. He appealed to a 
higher court which confirmed the sentence. 
When he was being conveyed to his doom the 
people attacked the escort. The archers who 
constituted his guards fled before the savage 
mob, as did the executioner who rode im the 
cart with the prisoner. The latter escaped. 

Patin tells Belin (August 27, 1649) that 
the Queen Mother and Mazarin were greatly 
afraid of what might happen to them when 
they returned to Paris after having had to 
flee from the city and then having laid seige 
to it: ““The executioner of an Italian was so 
afraid for his skin.” He adds that there need 


| 264 | 
be no more fear of his adding any new taxes 
or creating new offices. 

Mazarin and his agents repressed with 
the greatest brutality every manifestation 
of the sentiment of the public towards him. 
The animosity of the people found its chief 
vent in the so-called ‘‘Mazarinades,” pam- 
phlets and verses secretly printed and cir- 
culated from hand to hand in which the 
Cardinal was held up to ridicule and hatred 
in the most virulent manner. Patin writes 
to Spon (July 13, 1649) of a widow, named 
Meusnier, and her two sons who were 
arrested for printing some of these docu- 
ments. The elder son was sentenced to be 
hanged, the mother was to witness the 
execution of her son, then to be publicly 
whipped, and afterwards expelled from the 
kingdom and the younger son was to be sent 
to the galleys. 

When Mazarin died he left a large legacy 
to found the Collége des Quatre Nations, 
also bequeathing to France his magnificent 
library and the Palais Royal to the King. 
But this posthumous generosity did not 
lessen Patin’s animosity. He writes Fal- 
conet (March 9, 1661): 


They talk no more of the death of Mazarin. 
He has passed; he has folded his baggage; he is 


| 265 | 


in lead the eminent personage. But they do 
talk of his will, of his écus, and they are in diffi- 
culty as to who will succeed to his political and 
financial all-powerfulness. They say he has left 
two millions to build a great college, for the in- 
struction of poor gentlemen of four nations. One, 
I think, like the University at Paris or at Nevers, 
and that he is to be buried in the church of this 
college as its founder. Others say that he will be 
buried in Saint Denis, in France, having been its 
Abbé. But it little imports where they bury 
him, provided that he steals and tyrannizes no 
more over the people, as he did for too long a 
time. Bon Dieu! but their patience has been 
great with this tyrant. They say the college is to 
be built opposite the Louvre on the bank of the 
Seine. They say that the Queen Mother is not 
grieved at the death of Mazarin nor is 
the duc d’Anjou, and that the King has quar- 
relled with them aboutit. . . . . The four 
nations of which I have spoken above are the 
Spaniards, Italians, Germans and the English. 
He employs the money which he has stolen in 
France for foreigners, not for the French. 


SOCIAL LIFE IN FRANCE IN THE SEVEN- 
TEENTH CENTURY 

It is very hard for the modern mind to 

comprehend the curious mélange presented 


5 It was erected there at that time. The buildings 
are now occupied (1920) by the Bibliothéque 
Mazarin and the Institute de France. 


‘| 266 [> 


by the manners, customs, religion, super- 
stition, erudition and ignorance, in the 
social life of the seventeenth century in 
France. Until Louis xiv attained his major- 
ity all political power was in the hands first 
of Richelieu, afterwards of Mazarin, both 
brilliant, crafty, unscrupulous ecclesiastics, 
who balked at no means to gratify their 
ambitious ends. Their rule was necessarily 
despotic. There yet Imgered m France 
remains of the old feudal spirit, not yet 
entirely subdued to the idea of the concen- 
tration of power in the hands of a monarch. 
During the mmorities of both Louis xu 
and Louis xiv some of the great princes of 
France tried their best to overthrow the 
power held by Marie de’ Médici as regent 
for her son, or by Anne of Austria during 
the minority of hers. All these attempts 
proved futile against the craft and ability 
of the two cardinals on whom the Queens 
successively relied, but the first half of the 
century is marked by a succession of trea- 
sons, stratagems and wars, only finally to 
end in the despotism of Louis xiv. The 
great Condé was for some time in arms 
against France, fighting with Spanish 
troops against his country. The social life 
as detailed in the memoires and letters of 


‘| 267 } 

the time was marked by bloodshed and a 
looseness of morals which is almost beyond 
belief. Duels were so frequent and so fatal 
that the sternest edicts were issued against 
them. Every great man had a horde of 
parasites who would willingly commit mur- 
der or any other crime at his bidding. 
According to Patin even Cardinal Mazarin 
was guilty of having his enemies attacked 
by bands m his employ. He relates to Spon 
(November 4, 1650) that, some days before, 
a band of thirty armed men had attacked 
the coach of M. Ie duc de Beaufort 
in the rue St. Honoré. Fortunately for 
the latter he was not in it at the time 
and thus escaped the death which befell 
several of his servants. Patin implies 
that the assassins were in the employ of 
the Cardinal. The great nobles such as 
Condé, Conti, Gaston d’Orléans, all had 
their ““men”’ and indulged im Iittle private 
wars of their own, occasionally combining 
with one another against the royal 
authority. 

The Iackeys attached to the households 
of the nobles were a great source of trouble. 
They adopted the msolent bearing and 
manners of their masters and were involved 
in continual broils among themselves or 


| 268 - 


with the citizens. Patin in a letter to 
Falconet (January 26, 1655) relates a typical 
incident: 


A young gentleman, a captain of the guards, 
named M. de Tilladet, whose father yet living 
was once governor of Bapaume and later of 
Brissac, nephew of M. le Tellier, secretary of 
state, was miserably killed by the pages and 
lackeys of M. d’Espernon. The carrosses of 
the two masters met and ran into one another. 
The lackeys tried to kill the coachman of M. de 
Tilladet. The master jumped from his coach to 
prevent them, was overwhelmed by these rascals 
and brutally killed. The King wishes justice 
should be done and has issued a proclamation 
against lackeys in order to prevent such abuses, 
to wit that they shall not carry swords or fire- 
arms in the future, on pain of death; and they 
shall henceforth dress in suits of various colors, 
and not in gray, in order that they may be 
recognized. This proclamation was sent to 
Parlement to be certiffed and published. This 
has been done. It is affixed on all the squares 
and published throughout the city, but I do 
not know for how long a time it will be observed. 
The Jesuits say that the decrees of the Sor- 
bonne last no longer than a week. Perhaps it 
will be the same with these ordinances, because 
the French people make many good regula- 
tions but observe them badly. 


| 269 F 

Many of the great Iadies of the court in- 
dulged in the most shameless intrigues. 
Mazarin was accused of being the lover of 
Marie de’ Médici, and by many of being 
the father of Louis x1v. Marguerite de Valois 
and the duchesse de Navarre are said to 
have had the heads of their respective 
lovers, Coconas and La Mole embalmed 
after they had been beheaded for treason 
and to have kept these gruesome relics as 
trophies of their affection. The court was 
full of bastards of high lineage for whom 
provision was made at the public expense 
by the gift of political or ecclesiastical 
benefices. 

Murders were so frequent among the 
nobility that they only excited momentary 
interest. The wicked and eccentric Queen 
Christina of Sweden after her abdication 
while staying at Fontainebleau caused one 
of her household named Monaldeschi to be 
murdered in the hall of the palace. For a 
short time the court was horrified but a few 
weeks later she was in Paris, féted and 
entertained as if nothing had happened. 

Although there are frequent references 
in the “Letters” to the famous blue- 
stocking Queen, Christina of Sweden, 
Patin seems never to have met her per- 


‘| 270 | 


sonally. Writing to Falconet (October 6, 
1656) he says: 


The Queen of Sweden has not been in Paris 
as much as she had wished. She has seen next to 
nothing of it. Nevertheless she has recetved 
the approbation of all those who have met 
her here. She has much presence of mind and . 
perception. She is neither stupid nor bigoted. 
She loves neither women nor girls. She under- 
stands Latin well and knows more of it than 
many men who profess to do so. I know from 
a good source that when twenty-three years old 
she knew all Martial by heart. They say she 
makes much of Catullus, the tragedies of Seneca, 
and yet more of Lucian. . . . As to her con- 
version, brought about by the Jesuits, I do 
not know what to say of it. My deceased father 
told me that the fat M. du Maine (Mayenne) chief 
of the League, said that princes had no religion 
until they had passed the age of forty when 
they became old and wise, or at least should 
become so. When I consider the course of this 
Queen during the past two years, I recall the 
story of a certain Italian, who suffered from 
pérégrinomanie, or the mania for traveling. He 
came to Geneva and after having seen how the 
ministers lived, was asked by them what he 
thought of their religion. “It is not so bad,” 
he replied, “but ours is more useful in travel- 
ing.” Thus, m the design which she has to 


| 271 | 
travel in different countries, she can well take 
the advice of this Italian, and beyond doubt 
she could not easily see Rome, the Pope, and 
the many butterflies that are there, without 
travesting herself as she has done, whether she 
has done it seriously or not. 


The Marquis de Charton was murdered as 
he came out from mass at the church of 
the Augustines. Patin tells with some gusto 
how one of his murderers was beheaded 
and the other broken on the wheel. 


ABORTION 


Abortion was an antisocial crime which 
prevailed to a terrible extent in the highest 
social circles in France during the seven- 
teenth century. Bayle’ devotes one of his 
most interesting marginalia to a discussion 
of the question. In spite of civil and ecclesi- 
astical decrees and proclamations and of 
the special abhorrence with which the crime 
was regarded by the Church of Rome, the 
grandes dames of the time made light of the 
earthly and spiritual terrors which were 
held up to them and persistently resorted 
to crime to conceal their shame. Bayle uses 
this to support the thesis that the fear of 


6 Dictionnaire biographique. Guy Patin. 


| 272 

worldly shame is a stronger sentiment than 
that of religion. There was a large class of 
men and women who practiced abortion as 
a specialty, the latter drawn chiefly from 
the ranks of the midwives. It was estimated 
that over six hundred cases were known to 
have occurred, the greater part among 
women of high social position, m less than 
one year in Paris alone. Patin writes to 
Falconet (June 22, 1660) of a very notorious 
case of this kind; Mademoiselle de Guerchi 
had been seduced by the duc de Vitry: 


They make a great clamor here about the 
death of Mademoiselle de Guerchi. They had 
imprisoned the midwife at the Chatelet, but she 
has been taken from there to the conciergerie 
by order of the Court. The curé of Saint 
Eustache has refused sepulture to the body of 
the lady. They say that it was carried to the 
hotel de Condé, and was there put in quicklime 
In order to consume it soon, so that it could 
not be identified if anyone came to see it. The 
midwife has defended herself well up to now. 

. But I believe the question will be put 
to her. The vicars-general and the pleni- 
potentiaries went to complain to the Premier 
President that in a year six hundred women, 
by actual count, have confessed to killing and 
destroying their fruit. 


| 273 | 

The midwife of Mademoiselle de Guerchi, 
a woman named Constantin admitted that 
the Iady had died in her house but denied 
having given her any abortifacient. She said 
she was told that the patient had taken 
some medicine, but that when she first saw 
her she was so very ill that there was nothing 
to do but to try to alleviate her sufferings. 
The Premier President and the lieutenant 
criminel consulted Patin about the case. A 
surgeon, named Le Large, was accused of 
complicity, but managed to exculpate himself 
though Patin thought his excuses very Iame. 
The midwife was found guilty and hung at 
the Croix du Trahoir, as Guy says en belle 
companie. 

The midwives were under regulation in 
the sixteenth century, and their moral char- 
acter as well as their professional qualifica- 
tions were looked into very carefully. Patin 
writes to Falconet (September 14, 1660) 
that he had been appointed by the Premier 
President to hold an examination for the 
appointment of a midwife to the Hotel- 
Dieu, not only to serve the patients there 
but also to teach her profession in Its wards. 
Thus the vast clinical material m the enor- 
mous hospital was utilized for teaching pur- 
poses at a time when clinical teaching was 


| 274 F 
almost unknown elsewhere. Blondel, the 
Dean of the Faculté de Médecine, officiated 
with Patin at the examination, and a short 
time afterwards they held another examina- 
tion for the purpose of choosing a Iithoto- 
mist to the Hotel-Dieu. 

The clergy were as depraved as their 
flocks. Their charges were openly bought 
and sold, and those who had enough money 
and influence would accumulate a number 
of benefices which they shamelessly neglec- 
ted except for the collection of the incomes 
due from them. The lives of many of the 
most prominent ecclesiastics were shock- 
ingly immoral and fully justify the many 
aspersions which Patin casts upon what he 
sarcastically terms the sacred institution of 
celibacy. The Jesuits though not so openly 
immoral in their lives were ambitious and 
constantly minglmg in political affairs. 
The one bright spot im the religious life of 
the time was afforded by the followers of 
Jansen, the Port Royalists, and they 
were looked upon with suspicion and hatred 
by the authorities of the Roman Catholic 
Church because of their alleged heterodoxy 
but especially because of their open repro- 
bation of the disorderly lives of their fellow 
clergy and the earnest efforts which they 


| 275 | 
made to purify the church. To the non- 
medical student of the times, Patin’s letters 
are full of mterest because of their con- 
stant references to current events and to 
the great personages who figured in them. 


LOUIS XIV AND MEDICINE 


Garrison’ directs attention to three ept- 
sodes in the life of Louis x1v which had a 
great effect on the medical profession in 
France. In 1657 the King had an attack of 
what was probably typhoid fever. His 
recovery was attributed by many to the 
antimony which was administered to him 
by his physicians. The result was a great 
increase in the vogue of antimony, so 
much so that a few years later it was re- 
stored to the official pharmacopceia. It is 
needless to say that Patin did not agree in 
this opmion. In his correspondence he 
refers in a number of letters to the King’s 
illness. He had been taken ill while with the 
army and was conveyed from the camp in 
Flanders to Calais. From contemporary 
accounts there is but little doubt that his 
illness was typhoid fever, although, of 
course, that name was not given to it at that 


7 Garrison, F. History of medicine, Introduction. 
Philadelphia, 1921. 


| 276 | 

time. He was very sick and consternation 
prevailed throughout France. Prayers were 
offered m all the churches, and Valot, 
Guénault and Daquin were im constant 
attendance at his bedside. “Here is a power- 
ful Kmg of France in good hands! Would 
you not say that charlatans are only 
suffered and tolerated to maltreat princes!” 
The Kimg recovered, and Patin writes 
Spon that he has recetved an account of his 
iIness from one who was with him: 


I assure you that the King took only one 
third of an ounce of vin émétique, because the 
ounce had been put in three ounces of infusion 
of cassia and senna, and inasmuch as the first 
dose operated too much, he did not take the two 
others, but it was necessary to bleed him, finding 
him much worse and he has also been bled 
many times since. So that the King does not 
owe his recovery at all to this deathbearing 
(mortifere) remedy. If the King had died one 
would never cease to reproach them for having 
poisoned him, and they put themselves in 
great danger of such a reproach. 


In spite of Patin’s judgment the great 
majority of his subjects attributed the 
King’s recovery to the “‘antimonialists”’ 
and thought that their sovereign remedy 
was the chief factor in the happy result. 


Ra Bead 

The case certamly redounded to their 
credit and greatly increased their reputation. 

With the other two medical episodes in 
the reign of Louis x1v, Patin’s correspon- 
dence has no connection, but they are of so 
much interest that I will briefly mention 
them. In 1663 whenthe mistress of Louis x1v, 
Louise de la Valliére, was confined she was 
attended by Boucher, a man. This had 
an immense influence in furthering the 
cause of male midwifery. It is said that 
Louis x1v watched the proceedings from 
the concealment of some curtains. In 1686 
the King suffered from an anal fistula of 
which he was cured by an operation per- 
formed by the surgeon, Félix. The happy 
result brought about an mmmediate change 
in the status of the French surgeons as 
the King interested himself mm improving 
it. It may be recalled as an mstance of 
courtly servility that many of the courtiers, 
although not suffering from any trouble of a 
similar nature insisted on submitting them- 
selves to a like operation in order to show 
their submissive devotion to their royal 
master, and that those who had not suffi- 
cient nerve actually to subject themselves 
to the dangers and discomforts of an 
operation pretended to have done so and 


‘| 278 | 
had dressings ostentatiously applied to 
their anal region in order to deceive the 
public. 

Patin was a great admirer of Louis xiv 
and in a letter to Falconet (August 26, 
1667) he tells him with satisfaction that 
the King realizing that many officers and 
men in his army then campaigning in 
Flanders lost their lives from lack of medical 
care, had sent to Paris for three surgeons 
to serve with the army. A physician was also 
to accompany them to act as chief of the 
medical service and to govern the hospital. 
It should be recalled that at this epoch 
there was no organized medical service with 
the armies. The kings or great nobles who 
went to war were accompanied by surgeons 
just as in the time of Ambroise Paré. 


PARIS AND THE COURT 


Patin was born in 1601, he was therefore 
a boy of eight when Henri tv was assassi- 
nated by the monk, Ravaillac, at the instiga- 
tion of the Jesuits, and his hatred of the 
monks and Jesuits can be traced to the early 
remembrance of the horror with which the 
right-thinking people of France were in- 
spired by it, and to the early influence of 
the terror under which the Leaguers held 


‘| 279 F 
France during the last quarter of the six- 
teenth century. He came to Paris as a 
young man and lived there until his death in 
1672, never leaving the city except for a 
few very short journeys. Although not one 
of those courtly physicians who held lucra- 
tive positions at Court about the person of 
the King or some of the great nobles, the 
“Letters” gives glimpses of the ailments 
from which these grand people suffered. 
In them he retails much gossip of their 
doings and reflects the current opmions 
about them. The death of Richelieu, closely 
followed by that of Louis x111 m 1643, was a 
matter of vital interest to so zealous a 
guardian of the privileges of the Faculté 
de Médecine, and the great hopes which 
centered on Louis xiv, were shared by him 
In common with all Frenchmen of the time. 
The disorders incident to the Fronde, that 
very disturbing family quarrel, figure at 
length in his pages, interspersed with dis- 
sertations on the newest books, or recent 
acquisitions of fine editions of old ones for 
his library. We would not expect, nor do 
we find him taking any active part in the 
stirring events which kept Paris m a tur- 
moil throughout his life. He writes of them 
as an interested spectator, manifesting 


‘| 280 


‘considerable partisanship in the expression 
of his views but not precipitating himself 
into the vortex. The longest letter of Patin 
which we possess Is one written to Spon, 
bearing dates on different days throughout 
January, February and March, 1649, in 
which he relates the events in the warfare 
between the Parlement of Paris, and the 
party of the Queen Mother and Mazarin, 
whom he hated as much as he had his 
predecessor, Richelieu. He writes with the 
greatest freedom of all the great personages 
who were mixed in it, and particularly 
emphasizes the love of the Queen Mother, 
Anne of Austria, for the Cardinal. To the 
student of this epoch this letter is nvaluable 
for its vivid word pictures and the excellent 
summary it presents of the views of the 
people of Paris, and their Parlement in their 
memorable effort to overthrow the tyranny 
of the Cardinal and his royal mistress. It 
will be remembered that the Queen Mother 
acting as regent for her son, Louis xiv, then 
a mere boy had ordered the arrest of Blanc- 
mesnil and Broussel, two of the most re- 
spected members of the Parlement, and 
especially respected for the stand they took 
in opposition to Mazarin. At the news of 
their arrest the citizens rose en masse: The 


‘| 281 | 


Queen Mother, the young King, and Maz- 
arin fled to St. Germain, and surrounding 
the city with troops tried to reduce the 
rebellious populace to their authority. The 
Royal party patched up a reconciliation 
between themselves and their former de- 
clared enemy, the prince de Condé, and he 
was given command of the royal troops. 
The prince de Conti, Elboeuf and de 
Longueville were the chief leaders of the 
people’s party. 

One of the noblemen who took the part 
of the Parisians in their struggle against 
the despotism of Mazarin was the duc de 
Beaufort, son of the duc de Vendéme. The 
Dames des Halles, or marketwomen of 
Paris, played a prominent part in many of 
the political disturbances in that city, and 
during the Fronde they made themselves 
conspicuous on the popular side. Patin 
writes Spon (May 14, 1649) the following 
curious particulars about the young Duke 
and his female admirers: 


They talk of nothing here but of M. le duc 
de Beaufort, for whom the Parisians, and 
particularly all the women, have a very special 
devotion. As he was playing tennis in a resort 
in the Marais du Temple, four days ago, most 
of the women of the Halles (markets) went 


«| 282 le 


by platoons to see him play and offered vows 
for his prosperity. As they made a great tumult 
to get in and those in the place complained 
about it, it was necessary for him to quit play- 
ing and come to the door to put them off. This 
he could not do without permitting a small 
number of the women to enter, one after the 
other, to see him play. Seeing that one of the 
women regarded him with amiability he said 
to her: “Eh, my gossip, you wanted to come 
in. What pleasure do you get in watching me 
play and seeing me lose my money?” She 
answered him at once, ‘‘Monsieur de Beaufort 
play hardily, you will not want for money, 
my commére who is here with me and I, have 
brought you two hundred écus, and if more is 
needed, I am ready to go back and seek as 
much again.” All the other women commenced 
to cry also that their money was at his service, 
for which he thanked them. He was visited that 
day by more than two thousand women. Two 
days later, passing by Saint Eustache, a troop 
of women commenced to cry to him: “Mon- 
sieur, do not consent to marry the niece of 
Mazarin, whatever M. de Vendédme does or 
says to you. If he abandons you, you will lack 
nothing. We will give you a pension every year 
of sixty thousand livres in the Halles.” He has 
proclaimed that if they persecute him at Court, 
in order to be in safe keeping he would lodge 
in the center of the markets, where more than 


| 283 | 

twenty thousand women would guard him. 
This event caused more amusement than fear, 
but here is worse. This prince, aged thirty-two 
years, having overheated himself, drank of 
wine and beer, and suffered much pain in the 
kidneys, during which time he also vomited 
many times. When this was known in Paris, 
the people believed he had been poisoned at 
Mazarin’s order. His house was soon filled with 
an infinity of men and women. Even M. de 
Vendéme, his father, who is here now, believed 
he had been poisoned, and when the physicians 
assured him that he had not, he warned them 
that the poison was Italian, and that the 
Italians were subtler poisoners than the French. 
But at length he is cured and the Italians are 
cleared of that of which they were suspected. 


The people suspected, not without reason, 
that many of the nobility who acted as their 
partisans and by virtue of their rank and 
military experience commanded them in 
their conflict with the regular troops also 
served the Queen Mother and Mazarin. De 
Longueville left Paris on an expedition into 
Normandy to raise troops and to procure 
provisions. He left with the Parisians, as 
hostages, his wife and eldest son. Patin 
tells how during his absence Madame de 
Longueville gave birth to another son, who 
was appropriately christened Charles Paris 


| 284 | 

de Longueville, comte de Samt Paul, his 
godparents being the provost of the mer- 
chants, the president of the Parlement, and 
four aldermen of the city of Paris. The 
baby grew up and Madame de Sévigné 
describes his death in 1672, when he was 
killed on the banks of the Rhine as Louis 
XIV’s army was entering Germany. 

The mistrust of the people was justified 
by the discovery that a number of persons 
of high position who had remained in Paris 
were acting as spies and conveying informa- 
tion to the Mazarinists, as those who 
surrounded the young King were termed by 
the Frondeurs. Apropos of these spies 
Patin writes to Spon (February 20, 1649): 
“‘All these miserable hangdogs, men of 
quality and dignity make themselves spies 
for a foreigner, a trickster, a comedian; 
sell and betray their country and take the 
part of an Italian who is only good to be 
chased from it.’”’ Patin says that if Mazarin 
was compelled to flee from France he 
would not be able to go to Rome because 
the Pope was Pamphilio, and Mazarin had 
caused the murder of anephew of thelatter’s, 
which the uncle would promptly avenge. 
If he fled to Venice, where he was said to 
have accumulated money and goods in 


| 285 | 

preparation for a rainy day, the Pope would 
deprive him of his cardinalate and perhaps 
have him assassinated. Patin says that those 
who know him well think he would do 
better to go to Turkey, have himself 
circumcised, and trust to the mercy of the 
Grand Turk and his mufti rather than to 
that of the Pope, Cardinal Pamphilio, or 
Cardinal Pancirol, another prelate who had 
great influence with the Pope and was an 
avowed enemy of Mazarin. Later when the 
Court was at Samt Germain because of 
the rebellious attitude of the people, Patin 
says that many would like to march on 
Saint Germain, bring the King and his 
Mother back to Paris, and execute the 
Cardinal on the Place de Ia Gréve: 


This to be done as an example to posterity, 
and to teach Italians not to come here and 
place themselves so easily at Court, to the 
desolation and total ruin of a flourishing king- 
dom, as the Marquis d’Ancre wished to do in 
other times, but together with his wife and his 
followers in the end had made a bad bargain 
of it. Please God for the welfare of France 
that it was likewise with Mazarin. Helas! but 
we would be fortunate. 


The so-called war was conducted with 
but little spirit by the military leaders on 


q 286 | 


either side. The great Turenne lent his 
support to the Parlement side but took no 
very great part in the affair. There were 
many skirmishes but no real battles, and 
food seems to have been brought into Paris 
in sufficient quantities to prevent any real 
distress. Patin writes that he has “thank 
God! flour, bread, and wheat sufficient for 
more than a month for me and my family, 
with wine, money, and provisions for a 
much longer time, and though I am in a 
blockaded city, half besieged, I have no 
need nor want.” Finally a peace was con- 
cluded, which although it gave temporary 
satisfaction to the people yielded them no 
permanent advantages. Patin’s letter inter- 
mixes with his account of these events much 
bibliographic gossip and medical news. 

Patin describes to Spon (August 20, 
1649) most graphically the return of the 
Court to Paris, and the reconciliation that 
ensued: 


Finally the Queen Mother has returned to Paris 
bringing with her the King, at the solicitation 
of the two princes of the blood (duc d’Anjou 
and the duc d’Orléans), although she had no 
desire to do so, and Mazarin even less. He (the 
King) arrived. here Friday, the 18th of this 
month, at eight o’clock in the evening, in a great 


‘| 287 F 

coach which was very full. Among those with 
him in it were M. Ie duc d’Anjou, M. Ie duc 
d’Orléans, M. le prince de Condé, and Mazarin, 
who was so ashamed that he hid-himself so that 
one could scarcely see him. There were also the 
Queen Mother, Madame la duchesse d’Orléans, 
Mademoiselle, and Madame, Ia princesse de 
Condé, la douairiére, and the maréchal de 
Villeroi. Many of the city companies marched in 
advance. They entered by the rue Saint-Denis, 
went the length of the street until beyond the 
(Fountain of the) Innocents, then entered the 
rue de la Ferronnerie (in which the late King 
Henri tv was killed), and passing the entire 
length of the rue Saint Honoré entered into the 
Palais Cardinal, and all this journey was made 
among so many acclamations and so much 
joy of the people that there could not have been 
more. I, who am talking to you, who naturally 
hate ceremonies, seeing the great commotion 
that there was in the city, and the joy of every- 
body in it, was there also, and saw more kinds 
of people in greater numbers than I ever saw 
before. The Queen Mother said in the evening, 
while supping at the Palais Cardinal, that she 
had never believed that the people of Paris had 
loved the King so much. 


Patin took but Iittle delight m the gor- 
geous spectacles in which the mhabitants 
of Paris have from time immemorial taken 


| 288 | 


so great a pleasure. Writing to Spon’ he tells 
him of the entry into Paris of the ambassa- 
dors of Poland who were sent to ask the 
Princess Marie to become their Queen: 


The entry was made with such pomp as one 
has never seen the like. They entered by the 
Porte Saint Honoré to the Hétel de Vendéme, 
so that they had passed across Paris from end 
to end, also they were seen by an infinite 
number of people who ran in the morning to 
hold their place on the streets whereby they 
would pass. All that day I was very busy with 
people who had not strength to quit their beds, 
but I assure you that in the other streets where 
they did not pass, there was so great a solitude, 
that it seemed to me like a city deserted by 
famine or pestilence, from which I pray God he 
will preserve you and me. I could have gone out 
to the Porte Saint Antoine, where I could have 
seen everything easily, but I did not wish to take 
the trouble. These public spectacles scarcely 
touch me, they render me melancholy. I, who am 
naturally joyous and gay, instead of rejoicing 
in them as others do, when I see all this crowd, 
pity the vanity of those who cause it. It is true 
that these shows are not made for philosophers 
of the humor and capacity of which I would 
wish to be, but they are for the vulgar who are 
dazzled by this éclat and pass the time more pleas- 

2November 16, 1645. 


‘| 289 } 
antly because of it. That day I was longer than 
usual in my study and employed myself there 
sufficiently well. My neighbors said I did very 
wrong in not having been at the ceremony, and 
that it was the most beautiful thing in the 
world. They reproach me that I have too little 
curiosity and too much melancholy, and I say 
they are too wasteful of their time. I appeal to 
you about it. If you condemn me I promise you 
that the first time the Pope will come to Paris, 
I will go expressly to the rue Saint-Jacques 
ahead of him, where I will await him in a 
bookseller’s in reading some books, and it will be 
only to please you, because if King Solomon 
with the Queen of Sheba made their entrée 
in all their glory, I know not if I would quit my 
books for them. My study pleases me far 
otherwise, and I keep myself there more will- 
ingly than in the most beautiful palace of Paris. 


When Christina, Queen of Sweden, made 
her visit to Paris in September, 1656, Patin 
seems to have departed from his usual 
custom for he writes to Charles Spon 
(September 13, 1656): 


The Queen of Sweden has made her entrée 
into Paris, where she has been received with 
great magnificence. She entered by torchlight. 
It was nine o'clock in the evening when she 
passed over the Pont Notre-Dame. I never saw 
so many people as there were in the streets 


‘| 290 
when she passed. She was on horseback, imme- 
diately behind a beautiful dais that they carried 
before her. She had on a red jacket, a perruque, 
and a hat over her ear. 


Perhaps Patin condescended to witness 
her entrance because of her patronage of 
learning. 

Patin’s correspondence in 1660 is full of 
the joy which was felt throughout France 
at the marriage of Louis x1v with the Infanta 
of Spain. It was believed that thereby the © 
long and wearisome wars, both civil and 
foreign, in which the country had been almost 
continuously engaged since the death of 
Henri tv would be terminated. Nevertheless 
Patin growls at the tumult which agitated 
Paris on the occasion of the entry into the 
capital of the young King with his bride. 
Guy even meditated a temporary sojourn 
away from his beloved city. He writes 
Falconet (August 20, 1660): 


We have here nothing but the noise of drums, 
and of soldiers, and I believe, until the féte ts 
over we shall not have better times. I have some 
Latin to do, which is commenced but cannot be 
finished in this noise. I would be at Lyons with 
you for a week; we could converse together, 
inter privatos partetes, of many things quae 
litters non consignantur, and after the tumult 


‘| 291 F 

had lessened here, I would return by Roanne to 
Orleans by the Loire. . . . Our profession 
makes slaves of us. I shall never have any 
repose until I shall be buried and then they can 
make an epitaph for me similar to that of the 
Maréchal of France, named Trivulee, a Milan- 
ese, who lies buried in the Church of Saint- 
Nazaire at Milan, bic quiescit qui numquam 
guievit (here rests one who until now never 
rested). I have menaced my son, Charles, with it, 
who is always studying and never rests. 


Five days later Pati writes Falconet 
that he had been one of those who officially 
represented the University of Paris at the 
formal entry of the King and his bride. The 
various faculties assembled at five o’clock in 
the morning at the Church of the Mathurins 
in their official robes and headed by the rec- 
tor, who had to deliver a formal address to 
the King, marched to the place assigned 
to them in the faubourg Saint-Antoine. 
“There were thirty-eight doctors of medi- 
cine in their red robes, who were much 
gazed at,” says Patin with evident pride. 

Even an ordinary journey of the court 
must have constituted a wonderful spec- 
tacle. Patin® records that when Louis xiv 
went to Dion the royal party traveled in 

® Letter to Falconet, October 25, 1658. 


‘| 292 } 
one hundred and.ten carrosses each drawn 
by six horses, besides which there were the 
saddle horses and those which carried the 
luggage. 

Anne of Austria, mother of Louis x1v, died 
of a cancer of the breast on January 20, 
1666. She had been ill for a long time and 
Patin’s letters contain many references to 
the various charlatans who were called in 
to try their remedies on her during the 
last year of her life. In spite of the fact that 
she manifested friendship for Mazarin, 
Patin speaks with admiration of her man- 
agement of affairs during the minority of 
her son. Readers of Dumas will find inter- 
esting the references made by Patin to the 
trial and disgrace of Fouquet, and to many 
of the other characters who figure in the 
immortal pages of that writer of romance. 

Patin sympathized with Fouquet. In his 
Letters written during the period of his 
trial he retails much information throwing 
light on the sentiments of his contem- 
poraries. Fouquet was tried before twenty- 
two judges, nine of whom voted for his 
death,.the balance for perpetual banish- 
ment. Patin thought the King wished him 
to receive the death penalty. Be that as it 
may, the sentence was finally changed into 


‘| 293 } 

imprisonment for life. In 1664 he was 
sent to Pignerol, where he was closely 
confined until his death in 1680. At the trial 
of the Maréchal de Marillac in 1632, 
Fouquet was the only one of his judges 
who was brave enough to withstand the 
desires of Richelieu and vote against the 
infliction of the death penalty. He thus 
meurred the great Cardinal’s displeasure 
and only received the highest charges of the 
state during the regime of Mazarin. It is 
interesting that when he was himself in 
peril of his life he also was fortunate in 
finding those who bravely withstood the 
wishes of Louis x1v. His chief defenders 
at the trial were d’Ormesson and de 
Roquesant. Patin hints in a letter to 
Falconet (December 21, 1664) that Fou- 
quet might be poisoned im his prison: 


When one is within four walls one does not 
eat what he wishes or sometimes eats more 
than he wishes; and, moreover Pignerol pro- 
duces truffles and mushrooms. Sometimes they 
mix with them sauces which are dangerous for 
us French, when they are served by Italians. 
That which is good is that the King has never 
caused anyone to be poisoned, and has an up- 
right and generous soul, but can one say as 
much for those who govern under his authority. 


| 204 | 

Monsieur de Ia Roquesant was exiled into 
Brittany because of his brave defense of 
Fouquet. He was allowed to return to 
Paris in 1667, and Patin showed his appre- 
ciation of his honorable behavior by 
refusing to take a fee when called in to 
attend him. 

Patin writes to Falconet (June 22, 
1660) the followmg amusing account of a 
little trip that he and his wife made to 
Saint-Denis with his son, Robert, and his 
bride: 


Will you pardon me, Monsieur, if I write 
you of the debauch I made today, Tuesday, 
June 22nd? I let myself be taken by my wife 
and our two newly wedded ones to Saint- 
Denis, where I saw the fair, which was a poor 
thing. The church is beautiful but a little dark. 
In the treasury there are many toys and foolish 
things, pro more gentis. At the tombs of the 
kings I could not refrain from weeping, seeing 
sO many monuments of the vanity of human 
life. Some tears escaped me, likewise, at the 
grave of the great and good King Francois 1, 
who founded our Royal College. It is necessary 
that I confess to you my weakness, I even 
kissed it and that of his father-in-law Louis x11, 
who was the father of his people and the best 
king we ever had in France. There are no 
tombs erected as yet for the Bourbons. . . . 


| 205 F 

In the choir, on the right hand, beneath the 
grand altar, they have put during the last few 
days the duc d’Orléans, who died at Blois, 
February 2nd, on the seventh day of a con- 
tinued fever, with a fluxion of the chest and 
four doses of vin émétique, of which Guénault 
ordered the three last, saying it was the true 
method of curing him. . . . My wife was 
ravished with these bagatelles, and took for so 
many truths the little tales which were told 
her by a monk authorizing them with his wand. 
I was already informed of these foolishnesses 
when I was at Saint-Denis at the funeral of 
King Louis x11, with our Dean, M. de la 
Vigne, in 1642. 


PUBLIC EXECUTIONS 


Although Patin does not seem to have 
been possessed by the same morbid desires 
which led Charles Selwyn to attend, on 
every possible occasion, the executions of 
criminals; he nevertheless seems to have 
had a keen relish for the details of such 
events, and in his letters we find descrip- 
tions of terrible crimes and often much 
more terrible punishments interspersed with 
grave dissertations on professional . topics 
or tranquil recitals of bibliographic data. 
Pic, though not attempting any explana- 


‘| 296 | 

tion, points out that mention of executions 
and crimes are comparatively rare in Patin’s 
correspondence until the year 1654 from 
which time they increase ad nauseam. 

Thus he writes to Spon, on repeated 
occasions of the murder of a valet de chambre 
in the house of the duc d’Orléans in Paris, 
and of the subsequent execution of two men 
and a woman for the crime. The woman 
was hanged but the two men were broken 
alive on the wheel and old Guy recites 
with vivacity their sufferings before death 
kindly termmated them. On one occasion 
he writes of an execution which must have 
given him a thrill of exultation: 


At five o'clock yesterday, at the gate of 
Paris, they hung a chemist (who called himself 
a Provencal gentleman) for forgery. He was 
from Avignon. He said he prepared his antimony 
in furnaces where he made the false money. 
He was caught in the act and has been hanged 
from the end of a beam. 


The joy at seeing an antimonialist being 
hung for counterfeiting must have been 
great to Guy. 

He writes Spon (May 19, 1648) that “on 
that day they had broken on the wheel two 


‘| 207 
highwaymen, one of whom confessed that 
he killed more than thirty men.” 

Patin was filled with an unholy joy 
whenever an ecclesiastic was found guilty 
of any criminality and his letters contain 
many references to such cases, accompanied 
by comments such as he writes in telling 
Belin, fils (May 7, 1660) of a priest who 
was hanged and burned on the preceding 
Tuesday, “who was a bad rascal . 
There are two others yet in the Chatelet 
who are no better . . . The holy and 
sacred celibacy of priests fills the world with 
prostitutes, cuckolds, and bastards.” 

There was a Breton priest, Jean Cricant, 
whose execution Patin in a letter to Charles 
Spon (September 19, 1657) relates with 
some exultation. This man had been secre- 
tary and almoner to the bishop of Auxerre, 
but had seduced a nun and brought her to 
Paris, where he lived with her and gained 
a scanty living by practicing quackery. 
Patin had a patient with epilepsy to 
whom he had told the truth, that his case 
was incurable. The ex-priest promised to 
cure him by means of certain pills. The 
remedy made the poor patient worse and 
he brought suit against the quack to recover 
the money he had paid him. He laid bare 


] 298 | 
the evil life of the man, and consequently 
the quack and the nun were brought to 
trial for their immorality. The man was 
hanged and burned at the Gréve, and the 
nun was sent to the Madelonnettes. 

On August 4, 1670, a young man, named 
Pierre Sarrazin, attacked with a sword a 
priest who was saying mass at Notre-Dame, 
wounding him in two places. A few days 
later Patin writes about the affair to 
Falconet. He says he was a Huguenot of 
Caen, and that he believes him to have been 
out of his mind. Sarrazin was tried at once 
and on the very next day was burnt at the 
Gréve, after having first been paraded in 
front of Notre-Dame. Patin says he gave 
vent to no expressions of piety or religion, 
nor of regret at dying. 

To Falconet he writes (June 16, 1650) 
of a robbery and murder committed by a 
band of men of whom five had been cap- 
tured and broken on the wheel, two were 
yet In prison, and nine had escaped: 


I am much vexed that they have not the nine 
others, in order that they should undergo the 
punishment they merit. Is not the devil un- 
chained in Christendom that such crimes are 
committed by such men in the center of Paris? 
Do they do worse in Turkey, where they do not 


‘| 200 F 
preach the Evangel of the Messiah, and where 
there are no monks? As for me, I believe the 
end of the world will come soon when I see so 
many iniquities. 

He tells Spon (January 11, 1655): “They 
have just broken alive at the Croix du 
Trahoir a wicked hangdog and great thief 
named Delussel, enfant de Paris, aged 
twenty-eight years. I have never seen so 
many people gathered on the streets of 
Paris as there were to see him pass.” 

Nevertheless, to yudge from the following, 
Patin did not like the sickening sights which 
were presented by the prisons of those days. 
He writes to Spon (April 24, 1657) that a 
young man had been tried for a theft at 
the Chatelet, and sentenced to be hanged. 
When the sentence was pronounced he fell 
In an apoplexy. “Messieurs du Chatelet 
asked me to go and see him, but I could 
not decide to do it, the prison horriftes me 
so much. I was once sickened for three 
months by it and have not the heart to 
return there.” 

Writing to Belin, fils (October 8, 1655) 
Patin tells him that during that week he 
had made a public dissection, before a large 
audience, of a woman twenty-five years old 
who had been executed for counterfeiting. 


‘| 300 F 
DEMONIAC POSSESSION 


During the seventeenth century in France 
there was a great deal of discussion of the 
subject of demoniacal possession, a subject 
upon which Guy writes with great éclat and 
with a remarkable modernity of judgment 
and spirit. At the beginning of the century 
Martha Brossier, had succeeded in achiev- 
Ing great notoriety, pretending to be 
possessed by a demon and to have the 
power of exorcism. She seems to have been 
a nervous, hysterical young woman who 
traveled about France with her father using 
her psychopathy as a means of procuring a 
livelihood. She fmally came to Paris and 
displayed her occult phenomena, particu- 
larly at the Church of Sainte Genevieve. 
The Bishop of Paris appointed a commis- 
sion of physicians to examine her, and they 
reported that she was a neurasthenic and 
a fraud, and that they could find no evi- 
dence of any supernatural agency in her 
acts. The Parlement of Paris finally 
ordered her imprisoned. She was released 
and taken to Rome by a couple of 
ecclesiastics who hoped to exploit her for 
their benefit on that particularly favorable 
soil, but the cardinal d’Ossat, having 


‘| 301 | 

heard of her previous career cut short their 
project by causing her to be imprisoned 
m a convent. Simon Pietre wrote a 
treatise on the Brossier woman which 
he published under the name of Michel 
Marescot in which he showed the falsity of 
her claims. 

Another famous case of supposed de- 
moniac possession was that of Urbain 
Grandier, curé of the Church of St. Peter 
at Loudun, executed in 1634 as a sorcerer, 
and in support of whose claim to super- 
natural powers many books were written. 
Guy, in a letter to Spon (November 16, 
1643), says that his execution was brought 
about by the malice of Cardinal Richelieu, 
concerning whom Grandier had published a 
libellous pamphlet. 

Patin!® relates the end of the son of 
Laubardemont, the maitre des requétes who 
presided at the trial of Grandier: 


The ninth of this month, at nine in the 
evening, a carosse was attacked by robbers. 
The noise caused the citizens to run forth from 
their houses, as much perhaps from curiosity 
as from charity. There was firing on one part 
and on the other. 


10 etter to Falconet, December 22, 1651. 


{ 302 

One of the robbers was stretched on the pave- 
ment and a lackey of theirs arrested, the rest 
ran away. The wounded man died the next 
morning without making any statement, not 
complaining or stating who he was. At last he 
was identified. They know that he was the son 
of the maitre des requétes, named Laubarde- 
mont, who condemned to death in 1639 the 
poor curé Urbain Grandier, and had him burned 
alive, under the charge of having sent the devil 
into the society of the nuns of Loudun, whom 
they taught to dance in order to persuade the 
foolish that they were possessed by the devil. 
Is not this a divine punishment in the family of 
this unfortunate judge, to expiate, in some 
sort the cruel death of that poor priest, whose 
blood cries for vengeance. 

Readers of Alfred de Vigny’s celebrated 
romance “‘Cing Mars” will recall the very 
different ending of Laubardemont’s son 
in that book. Otherwise de Vigny’s story 
of the Grandier affair is very close to the 
facts as we know them, with the exception 
of the insanity of the nun, which is not 
recorded im history. Patin had a friend who 
was closely concerned in the scandal, 
namely, Claude Quillet, who was one of the 
curious characters of the time. After prac- 
ticing medicine with considerable success 
he became a priest: 


| 303 | 

Born at Chinon in 1602 he died at Paris 
in 1661. He was summoned to Loudun 
at the time of the outbreak of hysteria 
among the nuns to assist at their examina- 
tion. Later when some of the nuns at Chinon 
attempted a somewhat similar hysterical 
manifestation Quillet wrote some satirical 
verses in Latin about them. These offended 
Cardmal Mazarin and Quillet found it wise 
to join the suite of the Marechal d’Estrees, 
the French ambassador at Rome, and 
remain for a time in voluntary exile. 

While at Rome Quillet composed his 
famous poem “Callipaedia, or the Art of 
making Beautiful Children,’ which was 
published at Leiden in 1655. It enjoyed 
great popularity and was translated mto 
French and English. 

Patin says he often talked with him and 
found him both witty and wise. 

Patin in a letter to Charles Spon (June 
14, 1657) tells of visiting a patient one 
evening at whose house he found a choice 
- gathering of wits and literary men, includ- 
ing M. de Montmaur, Marolles, Sorel, the 
author of Francgion and of the Berger 
Extravagant, and the Abbé Quillet. He 
says that many good things were said, 
“about the pope, cardinals, and monks”’ 


[ 304 | 
and he sends Spon a copy of a verse which 
one of the company retailed: | 


O la belle fiction, 

O la rare invection 

Que ce feu du purgatoire! 

Le pape n’était pas sot, 

Qui nous donna cette histoire 
Pour faire bouillir son pot. 


They had a mutual friend in Gassendi, 
at whose house they must have frequently 
encountered one another. Patin says the 
Abbé (he was usually known by his eccle- 
siastical, not his medical title) was “a 
great red fellow with a short neck.” 

In de Vigny’s novel the Abbé Quillet 
figures as the hero’s tutor. He is repre- 
sented as actually taking the part of 
Urbain Grandier. 

Patin states that in all these possessions 
modernes those concerned are always women 
or girls, bigots or nuns, priests or monks, 
and that it is not a devil of hell that is 
responsible for them but a devil of the flesh, 
engendered by the holy and sacred celibacy, 
or it is rather hysteromania than a true 
demonomania. He accuses the monks of 
having favored such demonstrations in 
order to increase the demand for holy 
water, otherwise greatly diminished by the 


‘| 305 F 
writings of Luther and Calvin. He adds as 
proof that one sees no such cases in Holland, 
Germany or England, where there are but 
few monks and priests. The best of all 
writings on the subject he thinks ts the book 
by Johan W. Weyer, John Wier or Joannes 
Wierus, “‘De praestigiis daemonum,” but 
Guy gives a long sort of catalogue raisonné of 
books on the subject, by which it is plain to 
see he had devoted considerable time to the 
study of the literature of the matter. He 
refers among others to the writings of 
Bodineau, Caesalpius, Charpentier or Car- 
pentarius, Duncan, Riolan and Pietre. He 


adds: 


A certain Thyrocus, a German loyolite 
(Jesuit) has written much on this business, but 
there is nothing of value im all that he has 
written. You would say that these master monks 
had assumed the task of making known the 
devil, and showing his claws to the world, in 
order that one would have recourse to their 
spiritual toys and holy grains. 


It is curious to compare the views of 
Patin on the subject of witchcraft with 
those of his English contemporary, Sir 
Thomas Browne. 

Besides the works of Sir Thomas Browne, 
Patm was familiar with those of other 


‘| 306 | 

English authors. Writing to Belin, fils, 
(October 28, 1658) he says: “Bacon was a 
chancellor of England who died in 1626, 
and was a great personage, a mind curious 
and elevated. All that he wrote is good.” 

Saumaise, the literary antagonist of Mil- 
ton, was a friend of Patin’s who refers to 
his book against Milton. Patin speaks of 
him as l’excellent et l’incomparable personage. 

In one of his Ietters!! Patin excites our 
curiosity by telling Spon of a wonderful 
invention by an Englishman, the son of a 
Frenchman, which is able to run a coach 
from Paris to Fontainebleau, “without 
horses by wonderful springs. They say this 
new machine ts being prepared in the Tem- 
ple. If the design succeeds it will save much 
hay and oats, which are of an extreme 
dearness.”” 


LAST DAYS 


Concerning the Iast years of Guy Patin’s 
life we have but little information. After 
the Faculté de Médecine, March, 1660, had 
solemnly declared its approval of antimony, 
Patin seems to have lost his interest in Its 
affairs, or at least to have retired from active 
participation in them. Of one hundred and 


11'To Spon, January 20, 1645. 


‘| 307 | 

two of its members, ninety-two had voted in 
favor of the repeal of the decree against it. 
It must have been a bitter blow to the old 
man when the institution, of whose fame and 
interests he had been such a zealous parti- 
zan, declared itself so decisively in opposi- 
tion to his cherished prejudice. He con- 
tinued his correspondence with his friends 
in Lyons but the tone of the letters is even 
more embittered than in earlier years, and 
the depression of his spirits is marked. The 
death of his eldest son, the exile of Charles, 
and the triumph of his professional rivals 
all depressed and worried his advancing 
years. The last letter of Patin in the collec- 
tion published by Reveillé-Parise is dated 
January 22, 1672. He died a little over two 
months later, March 30, 1672. Nothing ts 
known of the nature of his last ilIness. He 
was buried on April 1, 1672, in the Church 
of St.-Germain I’Auxerrois, at eleven o’clock 
in the morning. 


| 308 | 


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TIVYANNY SNILVG OL NOILVLIAN] 


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hoy up anafrfoug Q anager] upeprypy sapiafuor Bs - oe 
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BIBLIOGRAPHIC NOTES 


The following ts a list of the most important 
material bearing on Guy Patin, which has been used 
in the present study: 

CaspareEtT. Un docteur bibliophile condamné aux 
galéres perpétuelles. Gaz. d. hop. Par., 1854, xxviii, 
93. [An interesting account of Charles Patin.] 

CHEREAU, A. Quelques lettres médites de Guy 
Patin. Union Méd., Patin, 1876, 3rd ser., xxi, 949; 
XXII, 12; 49; 129; 165; 237; 300; 381; 453; 533; 
621; 697. [Under the numbers 9347 and 9358 du 
fonds francais in the department of manuscripts 
the Bibliothéque nationale possesses two portfolios 
of original letters of Guy Patin. These number 
342, and were written between 1630 and 1670, 117 
are addressed to the Belins of Troyes, 169 to 
Charles Spon of Lyons, and fifty-four to the Salins, 
father and son who practiced at Beauvais, one to 
Bachey, a physician of Beaume, and one to the son 
of Claude Saumaise. Besides these letters in the 
Bibliothéque nationale, Reveillé-Parise published 
478 letters written by Patin to Falconet of Lyons. 
At the date when Chereau wrote (1876) it was not 
known where the originals were to be found. 
Chereau also states that from time to time unpub- 
lished letters of Guy Patin’s are found in private 
collections or offered at public sales. They are 
regarded as rarities and bring high prices. Chereau 


| 309 | 


{310 


publishes thirty-three letters m the course of these 

articles in the Union Médicale.] 

CuHEREAU, A. Bibliographie Patiniana—Catalogue 
chronologique, analytique et explicatif des ouv- 
rages composés par Guy Patin, et de ceux a la 
publication desquels il a contribué. Gaz. bebd. de 
méd. et dechir., Par., 1879, 2nd ser., xvi, 549; 
565; 481. [After commenting on the curious 
fact that Patin’s real literary output was so small 
compared with. his intense interest in all literary 
matters, Chereau proceeds to list his writings as 
far as he had been able to identify them. 

1. Cabinet des cantiques spirituels. Propres pour 
élever ’Ame 4 Dieu, recueillis des plusieurs Péres 
religieuses par G. P. B. Troisiéme part. A Paris, 
chez Anthoine de Sommaville, au Palais, en la 
galerie des Libraires, prés Ia Chancellerie. 1623. 
Avec privilége du Roy. [One of the religious Canticles 
in this book is signed with Patin’s initials and another 
with those of his father.] 

2. Théses written by Patin and disputed before 
the Faculté de Médecine de Paris. 

A. First thése quodlibétarre; December 19, 1624: 
Estne feminae in virum mutatio advvaros? Is the 
transformation of a woman into a man impossible? 
[Concluded in the affirmative.] 

B. Second thése quodlibétaire; November 27, 
1625: An praegnanti periculose laboranti abortus? 
[Concluded in the affirmative.] 

C. Thése quodlibétaire proposed by George 
Joudounyn on December 16, 1627, but written by 
Patin and presided at by the latter. It was entitled: 
Ergo pntpopavia balneum? Are baths useful in utero- 
mania? [Concluded in the affirmative.] 


Bhd 


D. Patin presided again, December 17, 1643, at 
the thesis of the bachelor, Paul Courtois, for whom 
he not only chose the subject, but wrote the thesis 
entitled: Estne totus homo d naturd morbus? Do all 
the diseases of man come from nature? 

E. March 14, 1647, Guy Patin presided at the 
thése cardinale of Jean de Montigny. To the thesis 
of Montigny, Patin added a disquisition of his own 
entitled: Estne longae ac jucundae vitae tuta certaque 
parens sobrietas? Is sobriety the most sure Mother of 
a long and agreeable life? [This was the thesis which 
got him into so much trouble with the apothecaries 
because of the fury with which he attacked them and 
their preparations. In it he said that antimony was 
diabolicon inter remedia monstrum; vin émétique was 
venenato stibio infectum; bezoar, idolum fatuorum; 
theriac, compositio luxuriae; mithridatum, berbarum 
deforme chaos; and confection of hyacinth and 
alkermes were diamargaritum et Arabum pigmenta. 
He said that these precious remedies were of no more 
use to cure diseases than lime or cinders, and that 
they were made by ignorant charlatans and birds 
of prey. The Apothecaries brought a process against 
him and it was in court on this occasion that he made 
his own defence with an eloquence which won him 
great applause and an acquittal.] 

F. On December 8, 1670, Jean Cordelle read a 
thesis entitled: Esitne sanguis per omnes corporis 
venas et arterias jugiter circumfertur? Is the blood 
carried without interruption by all the veins and 
arteries of the body? [Patin defended the negative 
side in a thesis which was published. Chereau 
quotes a sample of the opprobrious language used 
by Patin, and justly states that it affords a pathetic 


‘| 312 | 


spectacle to find a man of Patin’s professional stand- 
ing attempting to deny a fact which had been so 
clearly proven forty-two years previously. ] 

G. In 1671 Patin presided at another thése 
cardinale of Jean Cordelle, and wrote for the occa- 
sion a thesis against the use of theriac as a remedy 
in pestilential fevers: Estne theriaca pestilenti febre 
jactatis venenum? 

3. In 1628 there was published an edition of: the 
works of Ambroise Paré on the title-page of which 
was the following statement: “Les oeuvres d’Am- 
broise Paré . . . Reveués et corrigées en plusieurs 
endroits, et augmentée d’un fort ample Traicté des 
Fiebvres, tant en général, qu’en particulier, et de la 
curation d’icelles, nouvellement trouvé dans les 
manuscrits de l’autheur. Paris, Nicolas Buon, 1628.”’ 
On November 4, 1631, Patin wrote to Belin: ““The 
Paré of the last edition, wellbound, costs eight livres, 
without rebate. It is augmented in this last impres- 
sion by a new treatise on fevers, which has been 
added at the end of the book, and is made bya physi- 
cian intus et in cute mibi noto, without having put 
his name to it.” [Chereau argues from the style of 
the treatise that the anonymous author was no 
other than Patin.] 

4. In 1628 there was published at Paris an edition 
of the works of André du Laurens, translated into 
Latin from the French. The translator was. Guy 
Patin and he also enriched the works of Henri Iv’s 
famous physician with numerous notes. 

5. Enchiridion anatomique, compile et dress en 
bon ordre par M. Jean Vigier, corrigé et augmenté en 
cette derniére edition (par Guy Patin). Paris, J. 
Jost, 1630. [A small manual of anatomy.] 


| 313 | 

6. Traité de:Ia conservation de Ja santé par un 
bon régime a légitime usage des choses requises pour 
bien et heureusement vivre. Paris, 1632. [This 
treatise on popular hygiene was published as an 
addendum to a work entitled ‘‘Le médecin charita- 
ble” by Philibert Guybert. It first appeared in the 
seventeenth edition of Guybert’s book with a sepa- 
rate title page and pagination. The book was trans- 
lated into Latin by G. Sauvagneon of Lyons and 
published with the title ‘Medicus officiosus.”’] 

7. In 1635 an edition of the works of de Baillou 
was published at Paris, for which Patin compiled a 
copious analytical table of contents. 

8. In 1637 Patin edited an edition of the “Ora- 
tiones et Praefationes”’ of Jean Passerat, which was 
published at Paris. 

9. In 1641 a syndicate of publishers of Paris pub- 
lished the works of Daniel Sennert. [Patin had not 
only stimulated them to the enterprise but edited 
the book and wrote the preface. Sennert had died four 
years previous to its publication.] 

10. In 1614 Patin published a manuscript by P. 
Chanet, a physician of Ia Rochelle entitled ‘‘Consi- 
derations sur Ia sagesse de Charron.” [The author had 
left the manuscript in Patin’s charge.] 

11. Several pamphlets on behalf of the Faculté de 
Médecine in its contest with Renaudot. [These were 
anonymous but Chereau identified them by the 
records of the Faculté, which show that Patin was 
deputed to write them.] 

12. In 1648 Charles Guillemeau sustained a thesis, 
Estne bippocratica medendi methodus omnium certis- 
sima, tutissima praestantissima? Is not the Hip- 
pocratic method the most certain, surest, and most 


‘1 314 | 


excellent to cure the sick? [When Guillemeau pub- 
lished his thesis he asked Patin to add to it certain 
“‘Observations”” and he did so, we may be sure, 
with delight.] 

13. In 1648 he supervised the publication of the 
“Encheiridium anatomicum et pathologicum” of 
Riolan, and in 1653 his “Opera anatomica vetera 
recognita et auctiora.”’ [As Chereau says these are 
the chief literary evidences of Patin’s interest in 
anatomy, although in 1623 he was appointed Archi- 
diacre of the schools of medicine in the University 
of Paris, a position equivalent to that of chef des 
travaux anatomiques, and in 1654 he was made Pro- 
fessor of anatomy and botany in the Collége de 
France.] 

14. When Sauvagneon published the “Medicus 
officiosus,” a Latin translation of the work of Phili- 
bert Guybert with Patin’s “Traité de la conservation 
de Ia santé,” he added to ita little treatise by Nicolas 
Ellain entitled ‘‘Avis sur la peste.’’ At his request 
Patin wrote a number of notes on Ellain’s work. 

15. Sauvagneon also added to the ‘“‘Medicus 
officiosus”’ a translation of a little treatise entitled, 
“‘Quelques notes sur un livre de Galien: ‘De missione 
sanguinis,’ livre traduit en francais et commenté par 
Louis Savot.” To this he also got Patin to add some 
notes and ‘observations. 

16. Gérard Denisot, who died in 1594, was not 
only a distinguished physician of the Faculté de 
Médecine but also a poet. At his death his library 
was purchased by an advocate named Joly. Among 
its contents he found the ms. of an elegant poetic 
version of the “Aphorisms” of Hippocrates in 
Greek and French verse, written by Denisot. This 


ye 


ms. Joly presented to the Faculté de Médecine, 
accompanying the gift by a letter of presenta- 
tion written in Greek. The gift was made during 
the décanat ot Patin, in 1652. Patin translated 
Joly’s letter into Latin and added to it some anno- 
tations about Denisot. The letter m Greek with 
Patin’s translation was published in 1656 in a book 
entitled ‘“‘Divers opuscules tirés des Memoires 
de M. Antoine Loysel . . . publies par Claude 
Solyeee. + Par., 1656.” 

17. In the “Elogia”’ of Papyre Masson, published 
in 1656, those on Simon Pietre and Francois Miron 
were written by Patin. 

18. Van der Linden of Leiden dedicated the edi- 
tion of Celsus, which he published in 1657, to Patin, 
thanking him im the dedication for the great assis- 
tance he had lent him in the work. [Chereau does 
not state that Patin wrote any part of the book, but 
says that he lent Van der Linden all the various 
editions of Celsus which he possessed, many of them 
enriched by ms. notes by Fernel, and other savants.] 

19. A Jesuit priest wrote a life of Galen, “Vita 
Claudii Galeni, Pergameni, medicorum principis, 
expropriis operibus collecta, per R. P. Phil. Labbeum 
. . . ad V. C. Guidonem Patinum .. . Paris 
1660.” [How Patin came to be willing to publish 
anything written by one of the Order he so heartily 
detested is not explained, but the fact remains that 
he did. Patin wrote Falconet (May 28, 1660): ““The 
Father Phil. Labbe, a Jesuit, native of Bourges, has 
made a little volume of the life of our Galen, all 
taken from his works. He has given and dedicated it 
to me in ms. I am going to have it printed m octavo, 
and then we can send it to all our friends.”’] 


‘| 316 & 


20. Patin contributed many valuable notes and 
additions to the third edition of “‘La bibliographie 
médicale de Van der Linden,”’ published at Amster- 
dam in 1662. 

21. Patin was a great admirer of Gaspard Hoff- 
mann. [When Hoffmann died, in 1648, he left an 
unpublished ms. which Patin purchased from his 
daughter for fifty écus. Although he got the ms. 
in 1649 Patin did not succeed in getting it pub- 
lished until eighteen years later, when it appeared 
with the title, “Apologia pro Galeno, sive xphZto 
maéeiQn libri duo. ex bibliotheca Guidonis Patini.’’] 
Foucart. Gaz. d. bop. Par., 1847, 28., 1x, 403. [A 

short account of his life with no originality.] 

Monrtanlier, H. Gaz. d. bop. Par., 1864, xxxvil, 93; 
101; 113. [Gives an outline of his biography from 
the ordinary sources, and reviews many of his 
idiosyncrasies.] 

PaTin, CHARLES. Lyceum Patavinum, sive Icones 
et vitae professorum Patavii MDCL, xxxil, 
publice docentium. Pars trios, theologos, philoso- 
phos et medicos complectens. Patavil, 1682. 

Pic, PrERRE. Guy Patin, avec 74 portraits ou docu- 
ments, Paris, G. Steinheil, Editeur, 1911. 

Lettres choisies de feu Mr. Guy Patin, Docteur 
en médecine de Ia Faculté de Paris, & Professeur 
au Collége Royal. Dans Iesquelles sont contenués 
plusieurs particularités historiques sur la vie & 
la mort des scavans de ce siécle, sur leurs écrits & 
plusieurs autres choses curieux depuis I’an 1645 
jusque 1672. Augmentées de plus de 300 lettres 
dans cette derniére édition; et divisées en trois 
volumes; volume 1, A Cologne, chez Pierre du 
Laurens. MDCXCL. 


ony 


REVEILLE-ParisE, J. H. Lettres de Guy Patin, 
nouvelle édition augmentée de lettres inédites, 
précédée d’un notice biographique, accompagnée 
de remarques scientifiques, historiques, philoso- 
phiques et littéraires, avec un portrait et le fac- 
simile de l’écriture de Gui Patin, 3 vols. Paris, J. 
B. Balliére, 1846. 

St. LupGere, Moreau DE. Gaz. d. bop. Par., 18309, 
and ser., 1, 293. [Brief résumé of Patin’s life and 
opinions of no originality.] 

TRIAIRE, PAu. Lettres de Guy Patin, 1630-1672, 
nouvelle édition collationnée sur les manuscrits 
autographes, publiée avec I[’addition des lettres 
inédites, Ia restauration des textes retranchés ou 
altérés, et des notes biographiques, bibliograph- 
Iques, et historiques. Paris, Librairie Honoré 
Champion, 1907. [Only one volume has been pub- 
lished of this which promises to be the most com- 
plete and scholarly of all the editions of Patin’s 
letters. | 





INDEX OF PERSONAL NAMES 


Adam, 90 
Addée, 254 
Ader, Guilbert, 149 
Aesop, 81 
Agrippa, 179 
d’Aiguillon, duchesse, see de Vignerot, M. 
Akakia, Martin, 57 
Akakia (Sans-Malice) (family), 57 
Alain, 248 
Alaric, 141 
Alleman, Albert, 49 
Altius, see Hautin, J. 
Alva, duke of, 158 
Amory (bishop of Coutances), 170, 213 
d’Ancre, marquis, 108, 283 
Andromachus, 145 
d’Anjou, duc, 263, 284, 285 
Anne of Austria, 3, 9, 15, 65, 69, 214, 217, 261, 264, 278, 
290 
Antoine, Cardinal, 170 
Apuleius, 150 
Arbinet, Daniel, 54 
d’Arc, Jeanne, 97 
Aristotle, 91, 101, 107 
Arnauld, 79, 83, 182 
Artaméne, 141 
Artémius, 230 
Arundel, duke of, 142 
Auvergnat, 148 
d’Auxy, G., 27 
d’Avaux, 205, 206 
Avenzoar, 103 
Avicenna, 103 
319 


[ 320 | 


Bacon, 88, 304 

Bachey, 307 

de Bagny, 92 

Bahis, 228 

Baillou, 201, 311 

Balliére, J. B., 315 

Baralis, 160, 216, 248 

Barberini, 92 

Barré, Catherine, 118 

Bartholin, T., xvi, 143 

Bartholo, 248 

Bassompierre, 8 

Bauhin, Gaspard, xvi, 74 

Bayle, vill, 29, 127, 203, 269 

Bazin, 80 

Beaufort, duc de, 11, 265, 279, 280 

Beauvaires, 155 

Beda, Eli (des Fougerais), 155, 206, 223, 224, 227, 228 

Belin, Claude, 100, 101, 106 

Belin, Claude 1 (pére), x, xvi, 48, 50, 54, 58, 62, 70, 73, 75s 77+ 
79; 81, 90, 93, 100, 112, 122, 136, 137, 144, 147, 187, 190, 
196, 201, 222, 235, 237, 246, 249, 260, 307, 310 

Belin, Claude 11 (fils), x, xvi, 48, 50, 52, 54, 70, 74, 80, 88, 95, 
100, 101, 118, 145, 166, 173, 200, 236, 250, 257, 261, 295, 
297, 304 

de Bellay, 51 

de Bergerac, Cyrano, 185 

Beza, 81 

Bichat, 231 

de Biron (the maréchal), 108 

Blancmesnil, 10, 278 

Blondel, 204, 272 

Bodin, 86 

Bodineau, 303 

de Ie Boé, Franciscus (Sylvius), 101, 104, 105, 200, 220 

Boileau, 227 

Bolduc, 149 

Borelli, 104 

Bossuet, 22 

Boucher, 275 


4] 321 | 


de Bouillon, 11 

Boujonier, 248 

Bourbon, Nicolas, xvii, xviii, 201 

Bourbon (family), 292 

Bourdelot, Edmund, 213 

Bourdelot, Pierre Michon, 212, 213 

de Bourges, 34 

de Bourze, Abbé, 130 

de Bouteville, 7 

Bouvard, Charles (du Chemin), 56, 68, 85, 189, 214, 215, 233, 
248 

de Bragelonne, Viconte, 17 

Brayer, 205, 248 

Brissot, Pierre, 236 

de Ia Brosse, Guy, 191, 222 

Brossier, Martha, 298, 299 

Broussel, 10, 278 

Browne, Sir Thomas, 87, 303 

Buchanan, 52 

Bude, Guillaume, 172 

Buon, Nicolas, 310 

Bussy-Rabutin, 127 


Cabaret, 307 

Caesalpinus, 303 

Caius, John, 158 

Calvin, 80, 81, 303 
Campanella, 52 
Carpentarius, see Charpentier. 
Casaubon, 51, 52, 75 
Catullus, 150, 268 

Cayas, 132 

Celsus, 313 

de Chalais, 6 

de Ia Chambre, 59 

Chanet, P., 311 

Chapelain, 130 

de Chapelle, 7 

Charles, 199 

Charles 1 (England), 67, 211 


[ 322 } 


Charles 11 (England), 211 

Charles 11 ( Spain), 21, 22 

Charles v, 172 

Charles vin, 148, 150 

Charles 1x, 56, 57, 210 

Charles x, 44 

Charpentier (Carpentarius), xvi, 72, 171, 248, 303 

Charron, P., 51, 52, 86, 311 

Chartier, Jean, 53, 54, 155, 202, 203, 213 

Chartier, Philippe, 213 

Chartier, René, 104, 155, 213 

Chartier (family), 213 

de Charton, marquis, 10, 269 

de Chaulnes, Mme., 258 

Chereau, A., 109, 113, 119, 307, 308, 309, 310, 311, 313 

de Chevreuse, duchesse, 6 

Choart, Mile., 160 

Christina, 95, 99, 212, 267, 287 

Cicero, 91, 251 

Cing-Mars, 5, 8, 189, 259 

Citois, 65 

du Clédat, 155 

Clément, Jacques, 108 

Coconas, 267 

Colbert, 18, 20, 125, 126, 128, 129, 130 

Colot, Ph., 167, 168 

Colot (cousin), 168 

Colot (family), 167, 169, 239 

de Comberville, 130 

Concini, 2, 3, 4 

Condé, 3, 9, 11, 12, 14, 15, 16, 197, 212, 216, 217, 264, 265, 
270, 279, 285 

Condé, princess de, 285 

Constantin, 271 

Conti, 11, 14, 15, 265, 270 

Cordelle, Jean, 309, 310 

Cordus, Valerius, 136 

Corneille, viii, 232. 

Cortaud, 202 

Courtois, Paul, 192, 309 


1 323 


Cousinot (2), 248 

Cousinot, Jacques, 56, 64, 65, 233, 234, 248 
Cramoisy, 140 

Cramoisy (fréres), 141 

Crassot, 52 

Cresse, 231 

Cricant, Jean, 295 

Crollius, Oswald, 221, 235 

Cromwell, Oliver, 16, 67, 84 

Cyrus, the grand, 141 


Dame Quickly, 158 
Danesius, 171 

Daquin, A., 66, 227, 228, 274 
David, 149 

Davies, J., 92 

Delalain, Paul, 53, 130 
Delorme, Marion, 258 
Delussel, 297 

Denisot, Gérard, 312, 313 
Desault, 231 

Desfonandrés, 223, 227, 228 
Digby, Sir Kenelm, 88, 221 
Dodart, Denis, viii 
Duchesne, Joseph (Quercetanus), 224 
Dumas, 17, 290 

Dumoulin, Pierre, 125 
Duncan, 303 

Duport, 52 

Duprat, 172 

Dupuytren, 231 

Duret, Jean, 171, 201, 248 
Duret, Louis, 101, 102, 106, 171, 200, 248 
Duval, Guillaume, 62, 201 


Elboeuf, 279 

Ellain, Nicolas, 52, 312 
Erasmus, $1, 52, 71, 74, 77, 86 
Erastus, Thomas, 101 

d’Esmery (Particelli), 9, 158, 206 


| 324 | 


d’Espernon, 266 
Esprit, 227, 228 
d’Estouteville, 33 
d’Estrees, 301 
Eugéne, 23 

Eve, 150 

Evelyn, John, 92, 145 


Fagon, 63 

Falconet, André, xi, 28, 36, 40, 49, 50, 51, 55, 59, 68, 70, 71, 
72, 76, 80, 89, 91, 93, 96, 98, 105, 106, 107, 109, 110, 117, 
I1Q, 120, 121, 123, 124, 126, 129, 132, 135, 139, 144, 149, 
153, 154, 159, 160, 163, 167, 169, 170, 173, 174, 175s 
179, 204, 208, 214, 217, 228, 220, 231, 232, aaecneeee 
243, 244, 253, 255, 262, 266, 268, 270, 271, 276, 288, 
289, 291, 292, 307, 313 

Falconet, Camille, xii 

Falconet, Charles, xi, 105 

Falconet, Noél, xi, xii, 105, 106, 108, 109, 110, III, 112 

Félix, 275 

Fernel, 51, 52, 60, 73, 91, 101, 102, 106, 110, III, 112, 163, 
200, 209, 210, 211, 313 is 

Figaro, 248 

Fizes, 64 

Foesius, 104 

Fontenelle, viti 

Forcoal, Abbé, 253, 254 

Formy, xiv 

Foucart, 314 

des Fougerais, Eli Beda, see Beda, Eli. 

Fouquet, 17, 18, 99, 125, 127, 130, 140, 158, 290, 291, 292 

Framboisiére, 221 

Franco, 238 

Francois I, 171, 292 


Galen, 30, 55, 76, 91, IOI, 102, 103, 104, 106, 107, 143, 149, 
160, 163, 199, 201, 312, 313, 314 

Galigai, Leonora, 2 

Garrison, F. H., 273 


‘l 325 | 


Garnier, 122, 259 

Gassendi, 52, 93, 95, 150, 152, 176, 302 

Gay, xvi 

Gigeri, 125 

Godeau (pére Grasse), 84, 86 

de Gondi, Paul (de Retz), 10, 12, 15, 16 

Gorens (elder), 201 

de Gorris, 152, 155, 156, 173 

Gourmelen, E., 57, 102, 201 

Govin, 168 

Grandier, Urbain, 299, 300, 302 

de la Grange, 206 

Grotius, $1, 52, 75 

Guénault, 35, 59, 60, 66, 67, 80, 155, 179, 203, 206, 212, 217, 
218, 227, 228, 274, 203 

de Guercheville, Mme., 216 

de Guerchi, Mile., 270, 271 

Guillemeau, Charles, 59, 68, 163, 215, 248, 249, 311, 312 

Guise (2), 108 

de Guise, Henri, 26, 27 

Guybert, Philippe or Philibert, 137, 311, 312 

Gyrault, 168 


Hamon, 85 

Harvey, William, 29, 105, 142, 143 

de Hauranne, Jean Duvergier (Saint Cyran), 83, 84 

Hautin, Jean (Altinus), 78, 248 

Heinsius, 51, 52 

Heliot, Nic., 255 

Henault, 164 

Henri 11, 60, 108, 164 

Henri 111, 1, 26, 27, 108, 210 

Henri Iv, xi, 1, 2, 3, 5, 7, 11, 16, 30, 44, 67, 79, 105, 108, 131, 
161, 224, 276, 285, 288, 310 

Henrietta Maria, 22, 67 

Héroard, 68, 199, 215 

Herodotus, 150 

Heurnius, 101, 102 

Hippocrates, xi, 30, 31, 101, 102, 103, 104, 106, 110, 113, 149, 
160, 199, 213, 225, 236, 312 


| 326 


Hobbes, Thomas, 89 

Hoffmann, Gaspard, 74, 76, 101, 131, 142, 314 
Hollier, 101, 102, 110, 113 

Homer, 124 

Horace, 91, 150 

Horstius, 132 

de Houdan, 27 

Hureau, Germain, 54 


Ignace, Pére, 90, 141, 172 


James I, 211 

Jansen, 83, 272 

Javot, 167, 168 

de Jeanson, Jean (Patin’s wife), 113 
Job, 149 

Johnson, Samuel, 246 

Joly, Claude, 313 

Jost, J., 310 

Joubert, Laurent, 101, 200 
Joudounyn, George, 36, 308 
Juvenal, 91, 150 


Labbé, R. P. Phil., 313 

Laénnec, 231 

La Fontaine, 18, 232 

Lambert, Jean Baptiste, 252 
Lamoignon, 73, 76, 124, 174, 218 

La Mole, 267 

Le Large, 271 

Larrey, 231 

Laubardemont, 299, 300 

de Launay, 248 

du Laurens, Andrée, 52, 79, 159, 310 
du Laurens, Pierre, 315 

Leclerc, J. Francois (Marquis de Tremblay, Pére Joseph), 184 
Lefevre, 190 

Lienard, 252, 253 

Lipsius, Justus, 51, 52, 75, 86 

Littré, 46 


‘| 327 F 


de Longueville, 11, 14, 15, 279, 281 

de Longueville, Charles Paris (comte de St. Paul), 281 

de Longueville, Mme., 281 

Lotichius, 132 

Louis x11, 197 

Louis x11, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, 9, 41, 56, 67, 68, 184, 199, 200, 212, 213, 
Id, 218, 217, 222, 263, 277, 202,203 

Louis xv, 1, 9, 16, 17, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 41, 56, 63, 64, 65, 128, 
190, 214, 222, 230, 231, 263, 267, 273, 275, 276, 277, 278, 
282, 288, 289, 290, 291 

Louis xv, 64 

Louvois, 19 

Loysel, Antoine, 313 

Lucian, 107, 268 

Luther, Martin, 164, 168, 303 

de Luynes, 3, 4 


Macroton, 217, 228 

Mademoiselle, see d’Orléans, Mlle. 

de Maintenon, Mme., 129 

de Maisons, 205 

Malgaigne, 78, 238 

de Malherbe, 150 

Malmedy, 147 

Manessier, Claude, 27 

Marescot, Michel, 52, 57, 79, 248, 299 
Marie, Princess, 286 

Marie Thérése, 16, 21 

Marillac (family), 250 

Marillac (guarde des sceaux), 7, 69, 216, 217 
Marillac (marshall of France), 69, 216, 217, 291 
Marillac (master of requests), 250 
Marlborough, 23 

Marolles, 301 

Marot, Clement, 86 

Martial, 268 

Martin, Jean (2), 201 

Martin, L., 164 

de Marville, Vigneul, 251 

Masson, Papyre, 313 


| 328 | 


Matthews, Brander, 234 

Mauvilain, 155, 230, 232 

Mayenne (du Maine), 3, 268 

Mayerne, Théodore Turquet de, 103, 211, 212 

Mazarin, ix, 9, 10, 11, 14, 15, 16, 17, 20, 21, 51, 60, 65, 66, 67, 
68, 69, 72, 91, 92, 93, 96, 98, 99, 110, 158, 199, 205, 213, 
215, 217, 256, 259, 260, 261, 262, 263, 264, 265, 267, 278, 
279, 280, 281, 282, 283, 284, 285, 290, 291, 301 

de’ Médici, Catherine, 56, 57 

de’ Médici, 2, 65, 68, 79, 165, 199, 264, 267 

Meibomius, xvi 

Merlet, 181, 204, 226, 235, 248 

de Mesmes, 91, 92 

Metiries, 169 

Meusnier, 262 

Michon, Pierre, see Bourdelot. 

Milton, John, 177, 304 (+ 

Minivielle, 30, 32, 33, 161 

Miron, 72, 113, 188, 313 

Mithridates, 145 

Moliére, 67, 203, 223, 226, 227, 228, 229, 230, 231, 232 

Mommets, Madelon, 135 

Mommets, P., 135 

Monaldeschi, 267 

de Monceaux, 27 

de Montaiglon, xiv 

de Montaigne, Michel, xv, 51, 52, 86, 178, 179 

Montanier, H., 314 

de Montespan, Mme., 129 

de Montigny, Jean, 243, 309 

de Montluc, Blaise, 180 

de Montluc, Jean, 80 

de Montmaur, 301 

Montmor, 152 

de Montmorency, 8 

Moreau, 33, 54, 66, 68, 91, 150, 151, 181, IOI, 214, 215, 235, 
248, 252 

Moreau (elder), 139 

Moreau (family), 56, 57 

Morlet, 261 


1 329 


Mulot, 258 
Muret, 51, 52 


Naudé, 17, 51, 52, 91, 92, 93, 94, 95, 96, 98, 99 
de Navarre, duchesse, 267 

de Navarre, Henri, 27 

Nero, 145 


Orange, Prince of, 23 

d’Orléans, duchesse, 285 

d’Orléans, Gaston, 6, 7, 8, 16, 64, 197, 284, 285, 293, 294 
d’Orléans, Mile., 16, 285 

d’Orléans, Philippe, 22 

d’Ormesson, 291 

d’Ossat, 298 

Ovid (Ovidius Naso), 193 


Pallu, Victor, 181, 182 

Pamphilio, Cardinal, 282, 283 

Pancirol, Cardinal, 283 

Paracelsus, 101, 103, 150, 206, 211, 220, 224 


Paré, Ambroise, 56, 57, 62, 77, 78, 79, 102, 146, 209, 210, 238, 


239, 240, 276, 310 
Particelli, see d’Esmery. 
Pascal, 84, 85 
Passerat, Jean, 52, 75, 163, 311 


Patin, Charles, xvii, 74, 108, 109, 113, 119, I2I, 122, 123, 124, 
127, 128, 129, 130, 131, 132, 133, 134, 135, 175, 289, 305, 


307, 314 
Patin, Francois (Guy’s father), 26, 27, 28 
Patin, Francois (Guy’s son), 74, 113, 114, 120 


Patin, Guy, vii, viii, Ix, x, xl, XII, XII, Xv, XVI, XvIi, xviii, I, 


Hue. -G440, 17, 1, 20, 21,/23,'24, 25, 20, 27,.28, 20, 32, 34, 
35, 30, 40, 42, 43, 47, 48, 40, 51, 52, 53, 54, 57, 58, 50, 62, 
65, 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 72, 73, 74, 75, 76, 77, 78, 79, 82, 
83, 84, 85, 87, 88, 89, 90, 91, 93, 95, 96, 97, 98, 100, 101, 
102, 103, 104, 104, 106, 107, 109, IIO, III, 112, 113, 114, 
109010, 117, 118, I10, 120, +121, 122, 123,/ 12455124, 120, 
Sewet20,°141, 132, 135; 136, 137, 138,430, 140, 14%, 142, 
143, 144, 146, 147, 148, 149, 150, 151, 152, 153, 154, 156, 


‘[ 330 F 


Patin, Guy, 157, 158, 159, 160, 163, 164, 165, 166, 167, 168, 169 
171, 172, 173, 174, 175, 176, 177, 178, 179, 181, 182, 183, 
185, 186, 187, 188, 189, 190, 191, 192, 194, 195, 196, 198, 
19Q, 200, 201, 202, 203, 204, 205, 206, 207, 208, 209, 210, 
211, 212, 213, 214, 215, 217, 218, 210, 220; aanpeean ena 
224, 226, 227, 228, 220, 230, 231, 232, 234) 2460 ae, 
238, 240, 241, 242, 243, 244, 245, 246, 247, 240, 250, 251, 
242, 243, 245; 256, 257, 258, 240, 260, 201, 202 seas 
267, 260, 270, 271, 272, 273, 274, 275; 270; a7ou agonaens 
282, 283, 284, 285, 287, 288, 289, 290, 291, 292, 293, 
294, 295, 296, 297, 298, 299, 300, 301, 302, 303, 304, 305, 
306, 307, 308, 309, 310, 311, 312, 313, 314, 315 

Patin, Mme., see de Jeanson, J. 

Patin, Pierre (Pierrot), 74, 113, 119 

Patin, Robert, xvii, 74, 110, 113, 118, 119, 120, 121, 122, 173, 
232, 292 

Patin (family), 25, 28 

Le Paulmier, Julian (Palmerius), 78, 209, 210, 211 

Pecquet, Jean, 143, 166, 167 

Pelicier, Guillaume, 200 

Pellison, 18, 232 

Pére Grasse, see Godeau. 

Pére Joseph, see Leclerc, J. F. 

Perreau, 48, 155, 204 

Petrus Aurelius; 83 

de Ia Peyrére, Isaac, 90 

Peyrihle, xviii 

Philip 11, 20 

Philip rv, 21 

Pic, Pierre, xv, xvi, xvill, 36, $2, $3, 128, 129, 130, 190, 251 

Pietre, Anne, 56 

Pietre (family), 56 

Pietre, Jean, 55, 57, 137, 156, 201, 205 

Pietre, Nicolas, 52, 57, 91, 137, 148, 163, 181, 201, 248, 
255, 303 

Pietre, Simon (elder), 56, 57 

Pietre, Simon (younger), 57, 148, 150, 171, 248, 255, 299, 313 

Pijart, 155 

Pineda, 149 

de Pionne, 20 


ABS 


Plato, 91 

Pliny, 178, 179 

Plutarch, 28 

Potier, Michel, 151 
Praepositus, Nicholas, 136 
Primerose, 105, 142 


Quercetanus, see Duchesne, J. 
Quillet, Claude, 300, 301, 302 


Rabelais, Francois, 51, 52, 86, 131, 251 

Rainssant, 155 

Rampole, 180 

Ravaillac, 2, 67, 111, 276 

des Reaux, Tallemant, 82, 167 

Renaudot, Eusebius, 195 

Renaudot, Isaac, 195 

Renaudot, Théophraste, 53, 85, 155, 183, 184, 185, 186, 187, 
190, IOI, 192, 193, 194, 195, 196, 197, 202, 230, 242, 246, 311 

Renou (Renodaeus), 102, 136, 161 

de Retz, Cardinal, see de Gondi, Paul. 

Reveillé-Parise, J. H., viii, xi, xiv, xv, 25, 164, 229, 305, 307, 
315 

Rhazes, 103 

de Riant, Mme., 163 

Ricci, xviii 

Richelieu, Cardinal (Armand), ix, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 17, 43, 64, 
68, 69, 92, 165, 177, 184, 186, 187, 188, 189, 190, 191, 192, 
194, 199, 216, 256, 257, 258, 259, 264, 277, 278, 291, 299 

Richer, 226 

Riolan, Jean (fils), 29, 30, 33, 34, 35, 55, 56, 66, 68, 78, 79, 91, 
105, 110, 113, 143, 165, 166, 167, 169, 170, 171, IQI, 201, 
maa td. 235, 242, 303, 312 

Riolan, Jean (pére), 52, 56, 101, 110, III, 112, 150, 165, 201 

Riolan (family), 56 

de Rohan, 3 

Rondelet, Guillaume, 198, 200 

de Ia Roque, Tamisey, xiv 

de Ia Roquesant, 291, 292 

Ruffin, A., 168 


‘1 332 | 


Samt Cyran, see de Hauranne, J.D. 
St. Francis, 140 

Saint Jacques, Hardouin, 204 

de St. Ludgere, Moreau, 315 

St. Luke, 241 

St. Margaret, 140 

Saint Stephen, 169 

Saint Vincent de Paul, 149 
Sainte-Beuve, vii, xiv, XV 

de Sales, 51 

de Salins, 86 

Salins (the), 307 

de Sallo, Denis, 129, 130 

Salmasius, see Saumaise, C. 
Sanche, 215 

Sanctorius, 104, 105 

Sarpi, Paolo, 52 

Sarrazin, Pierre, 82, 296 

Saumaise, Charles (Salmasius), 32, $1, 2, 177, 178, 304 
Saumaise, Claude, 307 

Sauvagneon, G., 311, 312 

Savot, Louis, 312 

Scaliger, Joseph, 51, 52, 71, 74, 75 
Scaliger, Julius Caesar, 51, 52 
Scarron, 164 

Scheffer, xvi, 132 

Scudéry, George, 141 

Scudéry, Madeleine, 18, 141 
Seguin, Michel, 41, 52, 59, 205, 234, 235, 248 
Seguin (family), 56, 57 

Selwyn, Charles, 293 

Senac, 64 

Seneca, 73, 124, 268 

Senelles, 62 

Sennert, Daniel (Sennertus), 165, 311 
de Sévigné, M., 17, 18, 282 
Sganarelle, 203 

Shakespeare, 148 

Sheba, Queen of, 287 


Simon, 91 


‘| 333 | 


Siri, Vittoris, 259 

de Soissons, 182 

Solomon, 149, 287 

Songeur, Guillot le, 188 

Sorbiére, 167, 172 

Sorel, 301 

le Soubs, 155 

Spon, Charles, x, xi, 32, 34, 35, 65, 71, 73, 76, 83, 84,112,114, 
139, 140, 141, 164, 168, 169, 172, 181, 182, 183, 221, 232, 
252, 287, 295, 301, 307 

pon, accues, IX, X, XI, XVI, 25,27, 20, 32, 47, 48, 50, $25 $3, 
55, 59, 65, 66, 67, 70, 74, 77, 78, 79, 82, 84, 85, 87, 88, 90, 
eras. 114. 115, 116,187, 110, 121, 122,1123,7130,:140, 
143, 144, 146, 148, 151, 152, 157, 158, 159, 164, 166, 171, 
176, 177, 179, 186, 188, 192, 193, 194, 198, 202, 203, 204, 
BOs, 200,210, 212, 213, 219,-223, 224, 226, 232, 238,/240, 
244, 245, 247, 249, 250, 252, 253, 255, 258, 250, 262, 265, 
274, 278, 279, 282, 284, 286, 294, 297, 2909, 302, 304 

Steinheil, xv, 314 

Steno, 105 

Stuart, 177 

Sue, 121 

Sully, 2, 3,5 

Sylvius, see de Ie Boé, Franciscus. 


Tagault, 101, 102, 201 

Tartufe, 231 

le Tellier, 266 

Terence, 33 

Théophraste, 230 

Thélde, Johann, 207, see also Valentine, B. 

de Thorigny, Lambert, 160 

de Thou, 5, 51, $2, 200, 257, 258 

Thyrocus, 303 

de Tilladet, 266 

Tobias, 34 

Tomés, 228 

de Tournes, 77 

de Tremblay, marquis, see Leclerc, J. Francois. 

Triaire, xiii, XIV, XV, XVI, XVII, Xvill, 25, 78, 100, 136, 165, 167, 
186, 187, 188, 189, 196, 222, 315 


‘| 334 F 


Trivulce, 289 
Trousseau, 231 
Turenne, 9, 15, 284 
Turnebus, 171 


Valentine, Basil, 103, 206, 207, see also Thiélde, J. 
Valleriola, Francois, 149 

de Ia Valliére, Louise, 275 

de Valois, Marguerite, xi, 105, 267 

Valot, 60, 66, 67, 68, 158, 227, 254, 274 

Van der Linden, xvi, 313, 314 

Van Helmont, 103, 104, 105, 179, 219, 220, 221 
Varandeus, 200 

Vauban, 19 

Vautier, 59, 65, 68, 69, 199, 200, 201, 205, 215, 216, 217, 249 
Vehler, xi 

de Vendéme, 279, 280, 281 

Vesling, 142 

Veson, 66 

de Ia Vigne, 48, 191, 201, 235, 248, 255, 292, 293 
de Vigny, Alfred, 300, 302 

de Vignerot, Marie (duchesse d’Aiguillon), 258 
de Villeroi, 118, 285 

Virgil, 91, 124 

Vitry, 3, 4, 270 

Volckamer, xvi, 74 

Voltaire, viii, 12, 41 

Vossius, 75 

de la Vrilliére, 170 


Weyer, Johan W. (Wier, John; Wierus, Joannes), 303 
Wickersheimer, 43 

Willis, 104 

Wurtemberg, duke of, 132 | 


Xenophon, 150 


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